THE 

TRANSLATORS REVIVED; 

A 

JJingrajJriral Mtmm 

OF THE 

AUTHORS OF THE ENGLISH VERSION 



HOLY BIBLE. 



BY A. W. McCLURE. 




CHARLES SCRIBNER, 
1853. 



Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1S53. by 
CHARLES SCRIBNER, 
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the 
Southern District of New York. 



TOBIAS COMBINATION-TYPE, 
181 William-street. 



LC Control Number 



tmp96 031567 



PREFACE. 



This little volume has been long in preparation. It 
is more than twenty years since the Author's attention 
was directed to the inquiry, What were the personal 
qualifications for their work possessed by King James's 
Translators of the Bible ? He expected to satisfy him- 
self without difficulty, but found himself sorely disap- 
pointed. There was abundance of general testimony 
to their learning and piety ; but nowhere any particu- 
lar account of the men themselves. Copious histories 
of the origin, character, and results of their work have 
been drawn up with elaborate research; but of the 
Translators personally, little more was told than a mea- 
gre catalogue of their names, with brief notices of such 
offices as a few of them held. 

The only resource was to take these names in detail, 
and search for any information relative to each indi- 
vidual. For a long time, but little came to hand illus- 
trative of their characters and acquirements, except in 
relation to some of the more prominent men included in 
the royal commission. The Author quite despaired of 
ever being able to identify the greater part of them, by 
any thing more than their bare surnames. But devot- 
ing much of his time to searching in public libraries, he 



iv. 



PREFACE. 



by degrees recovered from oblivion one by one of these 
worthies, till only two of them, Fairclough and Sander- 
son, remain without some certain testimonial of their 
fitness for the most responsible undertaking in the re- 
ligious literature of the English world. In regard to 
some of them, who for a long time eluded his search, 
the revived information at last seemed almost like a res- 
urrection. As the result of his researches, which he 
has carried, as he believes, to the utmost extent to which 
it can be done with the means accessible on this side 
of the Atlantic, he offers to all who are interested to 
know in regard to the general sufficiency and reliable- 
ness of the Common Version, these biographical sketches 
of its authors. He feels assured that they will afford 
historical demonstration of a fact which much astonished 
him when it began to dawn upon his convictions, — that 
the first half of the seventeenth century, when the 
Translation was completed, was the Golden Age of 
biblical and oriental learning in England. Never be- 
fore, nor since, have these studies been pursued by 
scholars whose vernacular tongue is the English, with 
such zeal, and industry, and success. This remarkable 
fact is such a token of God's providential care of his 
word, as deserves most devout acknowledgment. 

That the true character of their employment, at the 
precise stage where those good men took it up, may be 
properly understood by such as have not given particu- 
lar attention to the subject, a condensed "Introductory 
Narrative " is given. In its outlines, this follows the 
crowded octavos of the late Christopher Anderson. He 
has gleaned out the very corners of the field so care- 
fully, as to leave little for any who may follow him. To 
his work, or rather to the skilful abridgment of it, in a 



PREFACE. 



V. 



single octavo volume, by Eev. Dr. Prime, all who desire 
more minute information on that part of the subject are 
respectfully referred. 

The writers to whom the author of this book is most 
indebted for his biographical materials are Thomas 
Fuller and Anthony a- Wood. The former, the wittiest 
and one of the most delightful of the old English writ- 
ers, — and the latter one of the most crabbed and cyni- 
cal. "What has been obtained from them was gathered 
wherever it was sprinkled, in scattered morsels, over 
their numerous and bulky volumes. Beside what was 
furnished from these sources, numerous fragments have 
been collected from a wide range of reading, including 
every thing that seemed to promise any additional matter 
of information. 

The work is, doubtless, quite imperfect, because after 
the lapse of more than two centuries, during which no 
person appears to have thought of the thing, the means 
of information have been growing more scanty, and the 
difficulty of recovering it has been constantly increased. 
Critical inquisitors may be able to detect some inaccu- 
racies in pages prepared under such disadvantages •; but 
it will require no great stretch of generosity to make 
due allowance for them. 

The general result, to which the Author particularly 
solicits the attention of any who may honor these pages 
with their perusal, is the ample proof afforded of the 
surpassing qualifications of those venerable Translators, 
taken as a body, for their high and holy work. We 
have here presumptive evidence of the strongest kind, 
that their work is deserving of entire confidence. It 
ought to be received as a " final settlement" of the 
translation of the Scriptures for popular use, — at least, 



vi. 



PREFA.CE. 



till the time when a body of men equally qualified can 
be brought together to re-adjust the work, — a time which 
most certainly has not yet arrived ! If that time shall 
ever come, may there be found among their successors 
the vast learning, wisdom, and piety of the old Trans- 
lators happily revived! 



CONTENTS. 



PAGB 

Introductory Narrative .11 

Venerable Bede 12 

John Wiclif # . .13 

Knyghton 15 

John de Trevisa . . , 17 

William Tyndale 19 

John Rogers .......... 33 

Miles Coverdale . . 34 

Cranmer's Bibles 39 

Edward VI 43 

Marian Persecutions • • .44 

Geneva Bible 47 

William Whittingham 43 

Anthony Gilby . • . • • • • . .51 

Thomas Sampson, D.D. ....... 52 

Queen Elizabeth ......... 54 

Parker's or the Bishops' Bible . • • • . . 55 
Hampton Court Conference . ; . • • • .57 

King James's Version Printed 59 

Made in Good Time .61 

Competency of the Translators . ... 62 

Their Mode of Procedure and Rules . . . . .67 



Viii. CONTENTS. 



Lauxcelot Andrews, D.D 78 

John Overall, D.D. '88 

Hadrian Saravia, D.D 93 

Richard Clarke. D.D. ....... 97 

John Laifield, D.D 97 

Robert Tighe, D.D. ....... 98 

Francis Burleigh, D.D. 98 
Geoffry King ........ 99 

Richard Thompson 99 

William Be dwell . . . ■ . . .100 
Edward Lively . . . . . . .103 

John Richardson, D.D. . . . . . 104 

Lawrence Chaderton, D.D. ..... 107 

Francis Dillingham . . . . . • .116 

Roger Andrews, D.D. . . . . . .117 

Thomas Harrison . . . . . . .118 

Robert Spauldlng, D.D. 119 

Andrew BrNG, D.D. 119 

John Harding, D.D. . . . . . .120 

John Reynolds, D.D. ...... 121 

Thomas Holland, D.D. 134 

Richard Kilby, D D. 138 

Miles Smith, D.D 141 

Richard Brett, D.D. ...... 144 

[Daniel] Fairclough, D.D. . • • • . .145 
Thomas Ravis, D,D. ...... 149 

George Abbot, D.D. 152 

Richard Eedes, D,D. ...... 162 

Giles Tomson, D.D 163 

Sir Henry Savile, Knt, 164 

John Peryn, D.D Itf9 



CONTENTS. ix. 

Ralph Ravels, D.D. . - . . , . .170 
John Harmar, D.D. . 170 

William Barlow, D D 17 2 

John Spencer, D D. ...... 177 

Roger Fenton, D-D- 180 

Ralph Hutchinson, D.D. 183 

William Dakins . . . . • . . 183 

Michael Rabbet . 184 

Mr. Sanderson 185 

John Duport, D D. . «... 186 

William Brainthwaite, D.D 189 

Jeremiah Radcliffe, D.D. 189 

Samuel Ward, D.D .190 

Andrew Downes, D.D. . , • . . .198 

John Bois . . • 199 

John Ward, D.D. 208 

John Aglionbt, D.D. 209 

Leonard Hutten, D.D. • 210 

Supervisors of the Work 212 

Thomas Bilson, D-D. . . • • . • .214 

Richard Bancroft, DD 216 

Conclusion . 222 

Revised Editions 223 

Importance of Circulating the Scriptures . . . 225 

Practice of the Early Christians 227 

No better Translators now to be found . . .232 
Opinions of Critics ....... 236 

Multiplication of the Common Version . . ,241 
Its Influence on Religious Literature .... 242 

An Obstacle to Sectarism 243 

Has Survived Great Changes 244 

Translators Blessed of God ... 247 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



The translation of the Bible into any language 
is an event of the highest importance to those 
by whom that language is spoken. Rut when 
such a translation is to be read for successive 
centuries, by uncounted millions scattered over 
all the earth, and for whose use so many millions 
of copies have already been printed, it becomes 
a work of the highest moral and historical inter- 
est. Thus the translation and printing of the 
Bible in English forms a most important event 
in modern history. Far beyond any other trans- 
lation, it has been, and is, and will be, to multi- 
tudes which none can number, the living oracle 
of God, giving to them, in their mother tongue, 
their surest and safest teaching on all that can 
affect their eternal welfare. 

Many attempts had been made, at various 



12 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



times, to put different portions of the Scriptures 
into the common speech of the English people. 
Of these, one of the most noticeable was a trans- 
lation of John's Gospel into Anglo-Saxon, made, 
at the very close of his life, by the " Venerable 
Bede," a Northumbrian monk, who died in his 
cell, in May, A. D. 735. A most interesting ac- 
count of his last illness is given by Cuthbert, his 
scholar and biographer. Toward evening of the 
day of his death, one of his disciples said, " Be- 
loved teacher, one sentence remains to be writ- 
ten." " Write it quickly, then," said the dying 
saint ; and summoning all his strength for this 
last flash of the expiring lamp, he dictated the 
holy words. When told that the work w T as 
finished, he answered, " Thou sayest well. It is 
finished !" He then requested to be taken up, and 
placed in that part of his cell where he was wont 
to kneel at his private devotions ; so that, as he 
said, he might while sitting there call upon his 
Father. He then sang the doxology, — " Glory be 
to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy 
Ghost !" and as he sang the last syllable, he 
drew his last breath.* 



* See Neander, Denkwiirdigkeiten, &c, III. 171 — 175; and 
Fuller, Church History, I. 149—151. 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



13 



The admirable King Alfred, who ascended the 
throne two hundred years after the birth of Bede, 
translated the Psalms into Anglo-Saxon. But 
the first complete translation which can be said 
to have been published, so as to come into exten- 
sive use, was that made by Wiclif, about the year 
13S0. It was not made from the "original He- 
brew and Greek of the Holy Ghost ;" but from the 
Vulgate, a Latin version, chiefly prepared by Je- 
rome during the latter part of the fourth century. 
John Wiclif was born in Yorkshire, England, in 
the year 1324. He was a priest, and a professor 
of divinity in the University of Oxford. His ar- 
dent piety was nursed by the Scriptures which 
gave it birth. He is commonly called " the 
morning-star of the Protestant reformation," and 
was one of the brightest of those scattered lights 
of the Dark Ages, who are often spoken of as 
"reformers before the reformation." Like Mar- 
tin Luther, his opposition to popish errors and 
corruptions was at first confined to a few points ; 
but prayer, study of the Bible, and growing grace, 
led him on in a constant advance toward the pu- 
rity of truth. He became in doctrine what would 
now be called a Calvinist ; and in church disci- 
pline his views agreed with those which are now 
maintained by Congregationalists. After encoun- 



14 INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 

tering many prosecutions and persecutions, having 
however a powerful protector in John of Gaunt, 
(or Ghent, in Flanders, his native place,) the fa- 
mous old Duke of Lancaster, Wiclif peacefully 
closed his devout and laborious life, at his rec- 
tory of Lutterworth, in 1384. Forty-one years 
after, by order of the popish Council of Con- 
stance, his bones were unearthed, burned to ashes, 
and cast into the Swift, a neighboring brook. 
" Thus," says Thomas Fuller, " this brook has 
conveyed his ashes into Avon, Avon into Severn, 
Severn into the narrow seas, they into the main 
ocean. And thus the ashes of Wiclif are the em- 
blem of his doctrine, w r hich is now dispersed all 
the world over."* 

Wiclif 's translation of the Bible was made be- 
fore the invention of the printing machines ; and 



* This noble passage from a favorite author, Wordsworth has 
finely versified in one of his Ecclesiastical Sonnets : 

" As thou these ashes, little brook, wilt bear 

Into the Avon, Avon to the tide 

Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas, 

Into main Ocean they, this deed accurst 

An emblem yields to friends and enemies, 

How the bold Teacher's doctrine, sanctified 

By Truth, shall spread throughout the world dispersed/' 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



the manuscripts, though quite numerous, were 
very costly. Nicholas Belward suffered from 
popish cruelty in 1429, for having in his posses- 
sion a copy of Wiclif's New Testament. That 
copy cost him four marks and forty pence. This 
sum, so much greater was the value of money 
then than it is now, was considered as a sufficient 
annual salary for a curate. The same value at 
the present time would pay for many hundreds of 
copies of the Testament, well printed and bound. 
Such are the marvels wrought by the art of 
printing, which Luther was wont to call " the 
last and best gift" of Providence.* It has be- 
come " the capacious reservoir of human know- 
ledge, whose branching streams diffuse sciences, 
arts, and morality, through all ages and all na- 
tions, "t Let us hope, with an old writer, " that 
the low pricing of the Bible may never occasion 
the low prizing of the Bible." 

Limited as the circulation of the English Bible 
must have been in its manuscript form, it still 
made no little trouble for the monkish doctors of 
that day. One of them, Henry de Knyghton, 
said, " This Master John Wiclif hath translated 



* Summum et postremum donum. 
t Darwin's Zoonomia, I. 51. 



16 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



the gospel out of Latin into English, which Christ 
had intrusted with the clergy and doctors of the 
Church, that they might minister it to the laity 
and weaker sort, according to the state of the 
times and the wants of men. So that, by this 
means, the gospel is made vulgar, and made more 
open to the laity, and even to women who can 
read, than it used to be to the most learned of the 
clergy and those of the best understanding ! And 
what was before the chief gift of the clergy and 
doctors of the Church, is made for ever common 
to the laity." If the publication of an English 
Bible in manuscript caused such popish lamenta- 
tions, we need not wonder that the multiplication 
of a similar work in print should afterwards awa- 
ken such a fury, that Rowland Phillips, the pa- 
pistical Vicar of Croydon, in a noted sermon 
preached at St. Paul's Cross, London, in the year 
1535, declared ; " We must root out printing, or 
printing will root out us !" 

Manuscripts of Wiclif's complete version are 
still numerous. His Bibles are nearly as numer- 
ous as his New Testaments ; and there are be- 
sides many copies of separate books of the Scrip- 
tures. They are quite remarkable for their legi- 
bility and beauty, and indicate the great care ta- 
ken in making them, and in preserving them foi 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



17 



nearly five hundred years. The New Testament 
of this version was printed in the year 1731, or 
three hundred and fifty years after it was finished. 
The whole Bible by Wiclif was never printed till 
two or three years since, when it appeared at 
Oxford, with the Latin Vulgate, from which it 
was translated, in parallel columns. 

Contemporary with Wiclif, was John de Tre- 
visa, born of an ancient family, at Crocadon in 
Cornwall. He was a secular priest, and Vicar 
of Berkeley. He translated several large works 
out of Latin into English ; and chiefly the entire 
Bible, justifying himself by the example of the 
Venerable Bede, who had done the same thing 
for the Gospel of John. This great, and good, 
and dangerous task he performed by commission 
from his noble and powerful patron and protector, 
Lord Thomas de Berkeley. This nobleman had 
the whole of the book of Revelation, in I^atin 
and French, which latter was then generally un- 
derstood by the better educated class of English- 
men, written upon the walls and ceiling of his 
chapel at Berkeley, where it was to be seen hun- 
dreds of years after. Trevisa, notwithstanding 
his translation of the Bible made him obnoxious 
to the persecutors of his day, lived and died un- 
molested, though known to be an enemy of monks 



18 INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 

and begging friars. He expired, full of honor 
and years, being little less than ninety years of 
age, in the year 1397.* Little else is known of 
him, or of his translation, which did not super- 
sede the labors of Wiclif. 

The first hook ever printed to ith metal types ivas 
the Latin Bible, issued by Gutenberg and Fust, 
at Mentz, in the Duchy of Hesse, between the 
years 1450 and 1455, for it bears no date. It is 
a folio of 641 leaves, or 1282 pages, in two vol- 
umes. Though a first attempt, it is beautifully 
printed on very fine paper, and with superior ink. 
At least eighteen copies of this famous edition 
are known to be in existence ; four of them on 
vellum, and fourteen on paper. Twenty-five 
years ago, one of the vellum copies was sold for 
five hundred and four pounds sterling ; and one 
of the paper copies lately brought one hundred 
and ninety pounds. Truly venerable relics ! 
Thus the printing-press paid its first homage to 
the Best of Books ; the highest honor ever done 
to that illustrious art, and the highest purpose to 
which it could ever be applied. 

The first Scripture ev 'er printed in English was 
a sort of paraphrase of the seven penitential 



* Fuller's Church History of Britain, I. 467. 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



19 



Psalms, so called, by John Fisher, the popish 
bishop of Rochester, who was beheaded by Hen- 
ry VIII. in the year 1535. This little book was 
printed in 1505. 

The first decided steps, however, toward giv- 
ing to the English nation a Bible printed in their 
own tongue, were the translations of the Gospels 
of Matthew and Mark, made by William Tyn- 
dale, and by him printed at Hamburg, in the year 
1524 ; — and a translation of the whole of the 
New Testament, printed by him partly at Co- 
logne, and partly at Worms, in 1525. After six 
editions of the Testament had been issued, he 
published Genesis and Deuteronomy, in 1530 ; 
and next year the Pentateuch. In the year 1535 
was printed the entire Bible, under the auspices 
of Miles Coverdale, w T ho mostly followed Tyn- 
dale as far as he had gone ; but without any oth- 
er connection with him. Of Coverdale, further 
mention will be made. But in the year 1537 ap- 
peared a folio Bible, printed in some city of Ger- 
many, with the following title, — " The Byble, 
which is the Holy Scripture ; in which are con- 
tayned the Olde and Newe Testament, truely and 
purely translated into Englysh — by Thomas Mat- 
thew.— MDXXXVII." This is substantially the 
basis of all the other versions of the Bible into 



20 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



English, including that which is now in such ex 
tensive use. It contains Tyndale's labors as far 
as he had gone previous to his martyrdom by fire 
about a year before its publication. That is to 
say, the whole of the New Testament, and of the 
Old, as far as the end of the Second Book of 
Chronicles, or exactly two-thirds of the entire 
Scriptures, were Tyndale's work. The other 
third, comprising the reniainder of the Old Tes- 
tament, was made by his friend and co-laborer, 
Thomas Matthew, who was no other than John 
Rogers, the famous martyr, afterwards burnt in 
the days of " bloody Mary;" and \yho, at the 
time of his immortal publication, went by the 
name of Matthew. 

William Tyndale, whose vast services to the 
English-speaking branches of the Church of God 
have never been duly appreciated, was born in 
the Hundred of Berkeley, and probably in the vil- 
lage of North Nibley, about the year 1484. His 
family was ancient and respectable. His grand- 
sire was Hugh, Baron de Tyndale. From an ear- 
ly age, he was brought up at the University of 
Oxford. Here, during a lengthened residence in 
Magdalen College, he became a proficient in all 
the learning of that day, and in the latter part of 
his time read private lectures in divinity. He 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



21 



was ordained a priest in 1502 ; and became a 
Minorite Observantine friar. His zeal in the ex- 
position of the Scriptures excited the displeasure 
of the adversaries , and ' ' spying his time," says 
Foxe, " he removed from Oxford to the Univer- 
sity of Cambridge, where he likewise made his 
abode a certain space." This place he had left 
by 1519. In total independence of Luther, he 
arose at the same time with that great translator 
of the Bible into German ; being equally moved 
w T ith him to resist the corruptions and oppres- 
sions of a priesthood, which sought to imprison 
and enslave the minds of all nations, by keeping 
from them " the key of knowledge." 

Returning- from Cambridge to his native coun- 
ty, he spent nearly two years in the manor-house 
of Little Sodbury, as tutor to the children of Sir 
John Walsh. On the Sabbath he preached in the 
neighboring parishes, and especially at St. Aus- 
tin's Green, in Bristol. At Sir John's hospitable 
board, the mitred abbots, and other ecclesiastics 
who swarmed in that neighborhood, were frequent 
guests ; and Tyndale sharply and constantly dis- 
puted their mean superstitions. At the first, Sir 
John and his lady Anne took the part of the " ab- 
bots, deans, archdeacons, with divers other doc- 
tors and great-beneficed men ;" but after reading 



22 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



a translation of Erasmus's " Christian Soldier's 
Manual," which Tyndale made for them, they 
took his part. Upon this, those " doctorly pre- 
latists" forbore Sir John's good cheer, rather 
than to take with it what Fuller calls "the sour 
sauce" of Tyndale's conversation. A storm was 
now gathering* over his head. Not onlv the ig- 
norant hedge-priests at their ale-houses, but the 
dignified clergymen in the Bishop's councils be- 
gan to brand him with the name of heretic. In 
1522 he was summoned, with all the other priests 
of the district, before the bishop's Chancellor. In 
their presence he was very roughly handled. In 
his own account, he says, "When I came before 
the Chancellor, he threatened me grievously, and 
reviled me, and rated me as though I had been a 
dog." 

It was not long after this, that in disputing 
with a divine reputed to be quite learned, Tyn- 
dale utterly confounded him with certain texts of 
Scripture ; upon which the irritated papist ex- 
claimed, — "It were better for us to be without 
God's laws, than without the Pope's !" This was 
a little too much for Tyndale, who boldly replied, 
"I defy the Pope, and all his laws ; and if God 
spare my life, ere many years, I will cause a boy 
that driveih the plough to know more of the Scrip- 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



23 



ture than you do /" A noble boast ; and nobly 
redeemed at the cost of his life ! He now clear- 
ly saw, that nothing could rescue the mass of the 
English nation from the impostures of the high 
priests and low priests of Rome, unless the Scrip- 
tures were placed in the hands of all. " Which 
thing only" he says, " moved me to translate the 
New Testament. Because I had perceived by ex- 
perience, how that it w T as impossible to establish 
the lay people in any truth, except the Scripture 
were plainly laid before their eyes in the mother 
tongue" 

When he could no longer remain at Sir John 
Walsh's without bringing that worthy knight, as 
well as himself, into danger, Tyndale went to 
London, with letters introducing him, as a ripe 
Greek scholar, to the patronage of that Dr. Tun- 
stall, then bishop of London, who afterwards 
burned so many of Tyndale's New T Testaments. 
The courtly and classical bishop refused to be- 
friend him ; and he who had hoped in that pre- 
late's own house to translate the New Testa- 
ment, was obliged to seek a harbor elsewhere. 
For nearly a year, he resided in the house of 
Humphrey Munmouth, a wealthy citizen of Lon- 
don, and afterwards an alderman, knight, and 
sheriff. During this time, he used to preach in 



24 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



the Church of St. Dunstan's in the West. By 
this time, he was convinced that no where in all 
England would he be permitted to put in act the 
glorious resolve he had formed at Little Sod- 
bur y. 

In January, 1524, with a heart full of love 
and pity for his native land, Tyndale sailed for 
Hamburg, being " helped over the sea" by the 
generous Munmouth, who also assisted him 
during his fifteen months' abode in that city. 
Here he so improved his time, that in May, 1525, 
he went to Cologne, and began to print his New 
Testament in quarto form. Ten sheets had 
hardly been worked off, before an alarm was 
raised, and the public authorities forbade the 
work to go on. Tyndale and his amanuensis, 
William Rove, managed to save those sheets and 
to sail with them up the Rhine to Worms, where 
they finished the edition of three thousand copies 
in comparative safety. A precious relic, con- 
taining the Prologue and twenty-two chapters of 
Matthew, is all that is known to exist of this 
memorable edition, which is in the German 
Gothic type. In the same year and place, 
there was printed another edition, in small-octavo, 
of which one copy is extant in the Bristol 
Museum. During the subsequent ten years of the 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



25 



Translator's unquiet life, spent in labor and con- 
cealment from foes, more than twenty editions 
of this work, with repeated revisions by him- 
self, were passed through the press. These, 
through the agency of pious merchants and others, 
were secretly conveyed into England, and there 
with great privacy sold and circulated, not 
without causing constant peril and frequent suf- 
fering to those into whose hands they came. 
Many copies fell into the grasp of the enemy, 
and were destroyed ; but very many more were 
secretly read and pondered in castles and in 
cottages, and powerfully prepared the way for 
the liberation of England from the yoke of 
Rome. This New Testament has been separate- 
ly printed in not less than fifty-six editions, as 
well as in fourteen editions of the Holy Bible. 

Besides all these impressions of the work as 
Tyndale left it, it has been five times revised by 
able translators, including those appointed by 
King James ; and still forms substantially, though 
with very numerous amendments, the version in 
common use. The changes made in these revi- 
sions, though generally for the better, were not 
always so. The substitution of the word charity, 
w T here Tyndale had used love, was not a happy 

change ; neither was that of church, where he had 
2 



26 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE, 



employed congregation. Still, large portions of 
his work remain untouched, and are read verbally 
as he left them, except in the matter of spelling. 
The fidelity of his rendering is such as' might be 
expected from his conscientious care. " For I 
call God to record," he says, in his reply to Lord 
Chancellor More, " against the day we shall ap- 
pear before our Lord Jesus, to give a reckoning 
of our doings, that I never altered one syllable of 
God's Word against my conscience ; nor would 
this day, if all that is in the earth, whether it be 
pleasure, honor, or riches, might be given me." 

Not only was this holy man faithful in his great 
work, but he was fully qualified for it by his 
scholarship. His sound learning is evident 
enough on reading his pages. Certain historians, 
however, while acknowledging his proficiency in 
Greek literature, have represented him as having 
little or no acquaintance with Hebrew, and as 
making his translations of the Old Testament 
from the Latin or else the German. As for Ger- 
man, then a rude speech just taking its " form and 
pressure " from the genius of Martin Luther, 
there is no evidence that Tyndale ever had much 
acquaintance with it. But of his knowledge of 
Hebrew there can be no question. In his answer to 
Sir Thomas More's huge volume against him, he 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



27 



accuses the prelates of having lost the under- 
standing of the plain text, " and of the Greek, 
Latin, and especially of the Hebrew, which is 
most of need to be known, and of all phrases, the 
proper manner of speakings, and borrowed speech 
of the Hebrews" In these words he clearly in- 
dicates his critical familiarity with the Hebraisms 
of the New Testament, which contains so many 
expressions conformed rather to the idiom of the 
Hebrew tongue than to that of the Greek. George 
Joye, once occupied as his amanuensis, who 
turned against him, bears unwitting testimony 
upon this point. " I am not afraid," he says, " to 
answer Master Tyndale in this matter, for all his 
high learning in Hebrew, Greek and Latin, 
fyc." What were the other tongues Joye referred 
to, we learn from Herman Buschius, a learned 
professor, who was acquainted with Tyndale 
both at Marburg and Worms. Spalatin, the 
friend of Luther, says in his Diary, — " Buschius 
told me, that, at Worms, six thousand copies of 
the New Testament had been printed in English. 
The work was translated by an Englishman stay- 
ing there with two others, — a man so skilled in 
the seven languages, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Ita- 
lian, Spanish, English, and French, that which- 



28 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



ever he spake, you would suppose it his native 
tongue." 

We must draw this account of Tyndale to a 
close. * But one curious incident must be men- 
tioned, which took place in 1529. Tunstall, then 
bishop of the wealthy see of Durham, bought up 
the balance of an edition of the New Testament, 
which hung on Tyndale's hands at Antwerp, and 
burned them. The purchase was made through 
one Packington, a merchant who secretly favored 
Tyndale. The latter rejoiced to sell off his un- 
sold copies, being anxious to put to press a new 
and corrected edition, which he was too poor to 
publish till thus furnished with the means by 
Tunstall's simplicity. A year or two after, 
George Constantine, one of Tyndale's coadjutors, 
fell into the hands of Sir Thomas More. That 
bitter persecutor promised his prisoner a pardon, 
provided he would give up the name of the person 
who defrayed the expense of this Bible-printing 
business. Constantine, being something of a 
wag, and aware that More was a dear lover of a 



* Those who would know all they can of Tyndale are referred 
to the First Volume of Anderson's Annals of the English Bible, 
which might have been entitled, Tyndale and his Times. 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



29 



joke, accepted the offer, and amused the Chan- 
cellor by informing him that the bishop of Dur- 
ham was their greatest encourager ; for, by buy- 
ing up the unsold copies at a good round sum, he 
had enabled them to produce a second and im- 
proved edition. Sir Thomas greatly enjoyed the 
joke, and said he had told Tunstall at the time, 
that such would be the result of his fine specula- 
tion. " This," as DTsraeli says, " was the first 
lesson which taught persecutors that it is easiei 
to burn authors than books." 

Early in 1535, Tyndale who had been con- 
stantly hunted by the emissaries of his English 
persecutors, was betrayed by one Phillips, a tool 
of Stephen Gardiner, the cruel and crafty bishop 
of Winchester. He suffered an imprisonment of 
more than eighteen months in the castle of Vil- 
vorde, where he was the means of converting the 
jailor, the jailor's daughter, and others of the 
household. All that conversed with him in the 
castle bore witness to the purity of his character; 
and even the Emperor Charles the Fifth's Procu- 
rator-General, or chief prosecuting officer, who 
saw him there, said that he was " homo doctus, 
pius, et bonus," — " a learned, pious, and good 
man." It was Friday, the sixth of October, 1536, 
when this - man, " of whom the world was not 



30 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



worthy," and who ought to be famed as the no- 
blest and greatest benefactor of the English race 
in all the world, was brought forth to die. Being 
fastened to the stake, he cried out with a fervent 
zeal, and a loud voice, — " Lord, open the eyes 
of the King of England !" He was then 
strangled, and burned to ashes. Thus departed 
one for whom heaven was ready; but for whom 
earth, to this hour, has no monument, except 
the Bible he gave to so many of her millions. 

" He lived unknown 
Till persecution dragged him into fame, 
And chased him up to Heaven. His ashes new- 
No marble tells us whither. With his name 
No bard embalms and sanctifies his song ; 
And history, so warm on meaner themes, 
Is cold on this." 

But there is a better world, where he is not 
forgotten. " Also now, behold, his witness is 
in heaven, and his record is on high." 

Old John Foxe, the martyrologist, w^ho justly 
calls Tyndale " the Apostle of England," gives 
the following beautiful sketch of the man — " First, 
he was a man very frugal, and spare of body, a 
great student and earnest laborer in setting forth 
the Scriptures of God. He reserved or hallow- 
ed to himself, two days in the week, which he 
named his pastime, Monday and Saturday. On 
Monday he visited all such poor men and women 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



31 



as were fled out of England, by reason of perse- 
cution, unto Antwerp; and these, once well un- 
derstanding their good exercises and qualities, he 
did very liberally comfort and relieve ; and in 
like manner provided for the sick and diseased 
persons. On the Saturday, he walked round the 
town, seeking every corner and hole, where he 
suspected any poor person to dwell ; and. where 
he found any to be well occupied, and yet over- 
burthened with children, or else were aged and 
weak, these also he plentifully relieved. And 
thus he spent his two days of pasti?ne, as he 
called it. And truly his alms were very large, 
and so they might well be; for his exhibition 
[i. e. pension] that he had yearly of the English 
merchants at Antwerp, when living there, was 
considerable, and that for the most part he be- 
stowed upon the poor. The rest of the days of 
the week he gave wholly to his Book, wherein he 
most diligently travailed. When the Sunday 
came, then went he to some one merchant's 
chamber, or other, whither came many other mer- 
chants, and unto them would he read some one 
parcel of Scripture ; the which proceeded so 
fruitfully, sweetly, and gently from him, much 
like to the writing of John the Evangelist, that it 
was a heavenly comfort and joy to the audience, 



32 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



to hear him read the Scriptures : likewise, after 
dinner, he spent an hour in the same manner. 
He was a man without any spot or blemish of 
rancor or malice, full of mercy and compassion, 
so that no man living was able to reprove him of 
any sin or crime ; although his righteousness and 
justification depended not thereupon before God ; 
but only upon the blood of Christ, and his faith 
upon the same. In this faith he died, with con- 
stancy, at Vilvorde, and now resteth with the 
glorious company of Christ's martyrs, blessedly 
in the Lord." 

The good man's work did not die with him. 
During the last year of his life, nine or more edi- 
tions of his Testament issued from the press, and 
found their way into England " thick and three- 
fold." But what is strangest of all, and is unex- 
plained to this day, at the very time when Tyndale 
by the procurement of English ecclesiastics, and 
by the sufferance of the English king, was burned 
at Vilvorde, a folio-edition of his Translation 
was printed at London, with his name on the 
title-page, and by Thomas Berthelet, the king's 
own patent printer. This was the first copy of 
the Scriptures ever printed on English ground. 

The next year, 1537, two translations of the 
entire Bible, printed in folio on the continent, 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



33 



made their appearance in England. One of 
these was Tyndale's version, completed and 
edited by his devoted friend and assistant, 
John Rogers, otherwise known as Thomas Mat- 
thew. The other was the work of Miles Cover- 
dale, afterwards bishop of Exeter. 

Rogers was born at Deritend in Warwickshire, 
about the year 1500. He was educated at Cam- 
bridge, and was for some years chaplain to the 
English factory at Antwerp. He also ministered 
for twelve years to a German congregation. 
He returned to England during the reign of 
Edward VI., in the year 1550. He was made 
rector of St. Margaret Moyses, and after that 
vicar of St. Sepulchre's ; two of the London 
churches. The next year he resigned the rectory 
on being appointed one of the prebendaries of 
St. Paul's. When " bloody Mary" came to the 
throne, he was at once in trouble, but refused to 
escape to the continent, as he might have done. 
For half a year, he remained a prisoner in his 
own house ; and during the whole of 1554 he was 
confined in Newgate among thieves and murder- 
ers, to some of whom he was an instrument of 
good. He was very harshly and cruelly treated, 
and being the first of Mary's victims, he is honor- 
2* 



34 INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 

ably known as the Proto-martyr of that fiery 
persecution. He was burned alive at Smith- 
field, January 4th, 1555. He thus suffered with 
great constancy and piety. His wife, whom he 
had married eighteen years before, was a German, 
Adriance de Weyden. She is sometimes called 
Prat, which is the English form of the same 
name, both meaning meadow. He was refused 
permission to see her ; but she met him with all 
her children, as he was on his way to the fatal 
stake. It has been much disputed, whether they 
had nine, ten, or eleven children. The fact 
seems to be, that, at the time of his imprison- 
ment in Newgate, they had nine ; and another 
was born afterwards. In documents written 
during his confinement, he repeatedly speaks of 
his ten children. His widow returned with her 
fatherless flock to Germany. Daniel Rogers, 
probably the eldest child, lived to be Queen Eli- 
zabeth's ambasssador to Belgium, Germany, and 
Denmark. Richard Rogers, the famous Puritan 
minister of Weathersfield, was, in all probability, 
another son of the martyr ; and if so, then the 
numerous families in New England which trace 
their descent from Richard, are descended from 
the illustrious Bible Translator and Protomartyr. 
The origin of Miles Coverdale is very obscure, 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



35 



no other person being known of that surname. He 
was a native of Yorkshire, and born in 1488. It 
is said that he graduated as Bachelor of Canon 
Law, at Cambridge, in 1531. He afterwards 
received a Doctor's degree from Tubingen and 
Cambridge. He was an Augustine friar, and en- 
joyed the powerful protection of the lord Cr urn- 
well while he was the prime minister of England. 
He was an eminent scholar ; and was put upon 
the work of translating the Bible by some influ- 
ential patrons, who also paid the cost of publica- 
tion. The first edition purports to be faithfully 
translated out of the German and Latin, and is 
dedicated to Henry VIII. and his queen, Anne 
Boleyn. It is dated 1535 ; but the place where 
it w T as printed is uncertain. It is a mistake to 
suppose, as many have done, that he acted in 
concert with either Tyndale or Rogers. That he 
was skilled in the Hebrew and Greek tongues is 
certain, though he professes to translate from the 
German and Latin, in which languages he had 
five versions before him. . His work was " set 
forth with the Kynge's most gracious license ;" 
and was warmly favored by the potent Crumwell, 
and by Cranmer, archbishop of Canterbury. 

But notwithstanding all this favor, his book 
could not displace the labors of the martyred 



36 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE . 



Tyndale, which received and retained such a de- 
cided preference, that Coverdale himself repeat 
edly edited impressions of the rival translation. 
Cranmer gave a decided preference to Rogers's 
publication of his own and Tyndale's labors, and 
entreated the Yicar-General Crumwell to exert 
himself to procure the King's consent, that it may 
be "read of every person, without danger of any 
act, proclamation, or ordinance heretofore grant- 
ed to the contrary, until such time that we, the 
Bishops, shall set forth a better translation, which 
I think will not be till a day after doomsday." 
The license was fully conceded ; and thus, almost 
before the ashes of Tyndale had had time. to cool, 
his labors received the warm sanction and appro- 
bation of the great men who had denied him all 
countenance or support, and who ten years before 
were quite indignant at his efforts. This trans- 
lation will never be suppressed again. It may be 
corrected and improved, and at times it may be 
denounced and burned ; and after seventy years, 
King James's fifty learned men may spend three 
or four years in making it, as they say, " more 
smooth and easy, and agreeable to the text." But 
the work has been substantially the basis of all 
the subsequent editions of the Bible in English 
unto this day. 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE . 



37 



Grafton, who printed Rogers's Bible just men- 
tioned, commenced the next folio edition, of 
two thousand five hundred copies, at Paris, 
in 1538. The reason for executing the work 
at that place was the high perfection to which 
the art of printing was then carried there. But 
when the edition was nearly completed, the 
Inquisition pounced upon it, and had nearly 
succeeded in destroying it. The printed sheets, 
however, were rescued and carried to London. 
Also the printing presses and types were pur- 
chased ; and even the workmen removed with 
them ; so that in two months more the entire 
volume was completed at London. At the end 
of these copies is found the inscription, — " The 
Ende of the New Testament, and of the whole 
Byble, fynished in Apryll anno 1539. It is the 
Lord's doing." The work was accomplished at 
the procurement and expense of the Lord 
Chancellor Crumwell. Thus after a struggle of 
fifteen years' continuance, since Tyndale left 
England, his Bible obtains a secure footing 
upon his native soil. Crumwell, as " vicegerent 
unto the King's Highness," issued his injunctions, 
that a copy of this book should be conveniently 
placed in every parish-church, at the joint ex- 
pense of the parson and the parishioners ; and no 



38 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



man should be in any way discouraged from 
reading, or hearing it read — but contrariwise, that 
every person should be stirred up and exhorted, 
to the diligent study of the Word of God. In 
another of the injunctions, the clergyman in 
every church is required to make, or cause to be 
made, one sermon, every quarter of the year at 
least, wherein he shall " purely and sincerely de- 
clare the very gospel of Christ." The issuing of 
such an injunction gives a deplorable view of the 
qualifications of the ministry, and of the miser- 
able plight of the people as to religious instruc- 
tion, at that day. An old historian, Strype, thus 
speaks of the interest excited by those old 
folios, usually secured by a chain to a reading- 
desk attached to one of the pillars in the 
churches, — " It was wonderful to see with what 
joy this book of God was received, not only 
among the learneder sort, but generally all 
England over, among all the vulgar and common 
people ; and with what greediness the Word of 
God was read, and what resort to places where 
the reading of it was ! Every body that could, 
bought the book, or busily read it, or got others 
to read it to them, if they could not themselves. 
Divers more elderly people learned to read on 
purpose ; and even little boys flocked, among the 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



39 



rest, to hear portions of the Holy Scripture read." 
Thus was brought to pass that memorable say- 
ing of Tyndale's to the mitred Abbots of Winch- 
combe and Tewksbury, — " If God spare my life, 
ere many years, I will cause a boy that drives 
the plough to know more of the Scriptures than 
you do !" All this was gall and wormwood to 
Stephen Gardiner, and the other popish clergy, 
who, as Foxe says, c - did mightily stomach and 
malign the printing of this Bible." 

During the next year, 1539, the printing and 
circulation of the Bible went on with great activ- 
ity. The King himself, in a public proclamation, 
urged upon his subjects, " the free and liberal 
use of the Bible in their own maternal English 
tongue," as the only means by which they could 
learn their duty to God or man. 

In the following year, those great Bibles, 
now called " Cranmer's Bibles," first appeared. 
These were published under the archbishop's 
direction, with a preface written by him, warmly 
pleading in behalf of the domestic reading of the 
Word of God ; and quoting, in favor of the prac- 
tice, some eloquent passages from Chrysostom 
and Gregory the Nazienzene. The following 
passage is taken from Chrysostom, who insists 
"that every man should read by himself at home, 



40 INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 

in the mean days and time, between sermon and 
sermon ; that when they were at home in their 
houses, they should apply themselves, from time 
to time, to the reading of the Holy Scriptures. 
For the Holy Spirit hath so ordered and attem- 
pered the Scriptures, that in them, as well publi- 
cans, fishers and shepherds, may find their edifi- 
cation, as great doctors their erudition. But still 
you will say, I cannot understand it ! What mar- 
vel ? How shouldest thou understand, if thou 
wilt not read nor look upon it ? Take the books 
into thine hands, read the whole story, and that 
thou understandest, keep it well in memory ; that 
thou understandest not, read it again and again. 
Here all manner of persons, men, women ; young, 
old ; learned, unlearned ; rich, poor ; priests, 
laymen : lords, ladies ; officers, tenants, and mean 
men ; virgins, wives, widows ; lawyers, mer- 
chants, artificers, husbandmen, and all manner of 
persons, of what estate or condition soever they 
be, may in this Book learn all things, what they 
ought to believe, what they ought to do, and 
what they should not do, as well concerning Al- 
mighty God, as also concerning themselves and 
all others." One edition of " Cranmer's Bible," 
which varies but slightly from Tyndale and Ro- 
gers, was issued this year, under the royal com- 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



41 



mand, sanctioned in the title-page and preface 
by two prelates of the popish party, Cuthbert 
Tunstal, bishop of Durham, and Nicolas Heath, 
bishop of Rochester. So potent was the will of 
the tyrant, who, about that same time, executed 
in one day, and at the same spot, three advocates 
of the " old learning," and as many of the " new 
learning," as popery and protestantism were then 
respectively known. So impartial in cruelties 
and persecutions was that odious monster of lust 
and tyranny. What an age ! when men suffered 
equally for not reading the Bible, and for not 
reading it with the despot's eyes. But how won- 
derful are the wavs of divine Providence in so 
ordering it, that the very Tunstal who was so 
eager to buy up and burn the labors of Tyndale 
when printed at Antwerp but half a score of years 
before, is now editing the same at London, in 
repeated editions ! These noble and finely print- 
ed folios, of which four or five impressions were 
made in little more than a year, were published 
at the expense and risk of Anthony Marler, a 
London merchant. Even the Bishop of London, 
the " bloody Bonner," chief butcher of the Pro- 
testant martyrs in the subsequent "burning 
times" of Queen Mary, actively promoted the 
circulation and reading of the Scriptures in Eng- 



42 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



lish. This vile hypocrite, and flatterer of royalty, 
set up six large Bibles for public perusal in his 
cathedral of St. Paul's, where they were read 
aloud to attentive throngs of ) T oung and old. Ste- 
phen Gardiner, the wily Bishop of Winchester, 
and other crafty and malignant opposers, tried 
many crooked policies to hinder the free course 
of God's word, but their subtle devices came to 
naught. x4.s Thomas Becon, afterwards Christ's 
faithful martyr, witnessed, " The most Sacred 
Bible is most freely permitted to be read of every 
man in the English tongue. Many savor Christ 
aright, and daily the number increaseth, thanks 
be to God !" 

Tyndale's translation had been many times 
printed under the names of Matthew, Taverner, 
Cranmer, Tunstal and Heath ; and under all of 
them, had received the royal sanction, and had 
been " appointed to be read in Churches." But 
still the name of Tyndale was offensive to the 
brutal Henry and his slavish parliament. By act 
of parliament, in 1543, his translation, though in 
current and almost exclusive use, was branded 
as crafty, false, and untrue," and was "forbidden 
to be kept and used in this realm, or elsewhere 
in any of the King's dominions." Acts of par- 
liament are said to be so near omnipotent, that 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



43 



" they can do any thing except changing a man 
into a woman ;" but they can no more bind the 
Word of God, than they can change the winds 
and light of heaven. The same act of parlia- 
ment which prohibited this version in one clause, 
ignorantly enforced its use in its other clauses, 
and also vainly attempted to restrict its use by the 
" lower orders" of the people. 

The wretched Henry VIII. died in 1546. He 
was succeeded by his only surviving son, Edward 
YL, who held the throne but six years and five 
months, when he died of consumption, at the 
age of sixteen. This intellectual and pious 
child was one of those " who trembled at God's 
Word,' 5 which he loved and venerated; and which 
had " free course and was glorified" during his 
brief reign. At his coronation, three swords 
were brought, to be carried before him, in token 
that three realms were subject to his sway. 
The precocious ' prince said that yet another 
sword must be brought ; and when the attend- 
ing nobles asked what sword that might be, he 
answered, — " The Bible !" That, said he, " is 
the sword of the Spirit, and to be preferred be- 
fore these swords. That ought, in all right, to 
govern us, who use the others for the people's 
safety, by God's appointment. " Adding some 



44 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



similar expressions, he commanded the Sacred 
A olume to be brought, and to be borne reverent- 
ly before him in the grand procession. In the 
course of his reign, the Bible cause prospered 
greatly. At least thirty-five editions of the New 
Testament appeared, and fourteen editions of the 
whole Bible in English. 

Edward's first Parliament repealed the Act 
passed by his father's last parliament against the 
labors of Tyndale. Cranmer, who was at the 
head of the regency, made no attempt to press 
the use of his own correction or revision of Tvn- 
dale's version ; and most of the editions followed 
the older copies, which were the more popular. 
When Henry died, there were fourteen printing- 
offices in England. In Edward's time these were 
increased to fifty-seven ; of which, not less than 
thirty-one, and these the most respectable, were 
enofa^ed either in printing or publishing the Sa- 
cred Scriptures. This short reign was a period 
of unexampled activity in the good work, which 
was sadlv interrupted by the lamented death of 
the king in 1553. 

His reign was followed by that of his sister, the 
bigoted and melancholy Mary ; who, during her 
reign of five vears and more, did her utmost to 
suppress the Word of God in her realm, and to 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



45 



restore the authority of Romish corruptions and 
pretended traditions. It was not till she had 
been more than a year and a half on the throne, 
that she felt herself seated firmly enough to dip 
her hands in the blood of her Protestant subjects. 
During this time, hundreds who saw the gradual 
rising of the storm of persecution, fled for shelter 
to continental Europe. Nearly one thousand of 
these exiles were learned Englishmen, who were 
scattered abroad in many cities. Meanwhile, in 
England, two hundred and eighty-eight faithful 
martyrs, including one arch-bishop, four bishops, 
many clergymen and doctors in divinity, as also 
men, women and children of every rank in life, 
were committed to the flames for their love to 
God's Word, and their adherence to its teachings. 
The first who thus suffered was that John Rogers 
w T ho had done so much toward the translation, 
printing, and circulation of the Bible in English. 
There is now, in this country, in the hands of one 
of his descendants, a copy of the Bible which had 
been for the private use of that holy martyr, 
whose effigy makes such a prominent figure in 
the famous New England Primer. Many others 
were famished to death, or pined and expired in 
unwholesome dungeons. Miles Coverdale, who 



46 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



had been so active in the business of translating 
and editing the Bible, had been made Bishop of 
Exeter by Edward VI. ; but two years after, on 
the accession of Mary, he lost his office, and was 
imprisoned for two years and a half. He was 
several times examined before his inquisitors, and 
was in extreme peril of his life. But in February, 
1555, he was allowed to leave the realm, at the 
intercession of Christian II., King of Denmark.* 

During the Marfan persecution, there was no 
proclamation expressly prohibiting the reading 
of the Bible, or calling in the copies to be 
burned. Still several occasions are recorded, in 
which copies of the sacred volume were con- 
signed to the flames. Very many were carried 
abroad by the numerous fugitives. And many 
were concealed in private places. Some were 
even built up in closets whose doors were con- 
cealed by masonry. 



* In loo 9, after Mary's miserable death, Coyerdale returned to 
England ; but being now a zealous non- conformist, he repeatedly 
refused to resume his bishopric. He continued to preach, in r 
somewhat private way, as long as he lived ; and died most hap- 
pily, February, 1569, in the eighty-first year of his age, much 
venerated for his virtues, labors, and sufferings, and regarded as a 
"firebrand plucked out of the burning.'' 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



47 



" Fierce whiskered guards that volume sought in vain, 
Enjoyed by stealth, and hid with anxious pain ; 
"While all around was misery and gloom, 
This shewed the boundless bliss beyond the tomb ; 
Freed from the venal priest, — the feudal rod, 
It led the sufferer's weary steps to God : 
And when his painful course on earth was run, 
This, his chief wealth, descended to his son." 

It is a remarkable fact, that, while of a laro*e 
proportion of the many books printed in England 
up to this date, 1558, not a vestige is to be found in 
our day, there is scarce one of the many editions 
of the Bible and Testament of which one or more 
copies are not preserved. Such has ever been 
God's watchful care in the preservation of his 
blessed Book. 

The cessation of open operations in publish- 
ing the Bible in England was attended by one 
signal advantage. It gave opportunity for a new 
and very important revision of the translation. 

The great work first effected by the exiled 
Tyndale some twenty-five years before, during 
his banishment in Europe, was now ably revised 
by another exiled scholar, and again introduced 
into England when every port seemed to be shut 
against it. This was the celebrated " Geneva 
Testament," which is a reprint of Tyndale's, 
after carefully comparing it once more with the 



48 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



Greek original, and various translations in other 
tongues, and making many decided improvements, 
forming by far the best form of the English ver- 
sion, which had till then appeared. The first 
edition, which is now rare, is noted for the beauty 
of the type and paper. It left the press in June, 
1557. It is the first English Testament divided 
into verses, and it led the way to a revision of 
the whole Bible. It is not positively known by 
whom this good work was done ; but there is no 
doubt but that the person was William Whitting- 
ham. He was a native of Lanchester, near Dur- 
ham, born in 1524. He was of a good family, a 
Fellow of one of the Colleges at Oxford ; and 
had spent three years in foreign travel, and at the 
Universities in France. When Mary mounted 
the throne, he betook himself first to Frankfort 
in Germany. A year later, in 1555, he removed 
to Geneva, where he was ordained as minister of 
the English Congregation, of some hundred mem- 
bers, and where he married Catharine Chauvin, 
the sister of John Calvin.* Having issued the 
New Testament of the Geneva version, he was 
aided to some extent by tw T o of his learned fellow- 
exiles in revising the entire Scriptures, on which 



* Calvinus is the Latin, form of the French name Chauvin. 



IN'TRODL 7 CTORY NARRATIVE. 



49 



they were engaged night and day in 1558, the 
year that hapless Mary died of a broken heart.* 
They continued their labors till April, 1560, when 
the whole work was finished. The expense was 
defrayed by the wealthier members of the Eng- 
lish Congregation at Geneva. Of this revision, 
numerous editions were printed in the course of 
the next eighty years. It was several times re- 
printed even after King James's translation was 
published, as it was very popular with the Puri 
tans on account of the numerous very brief mar- 
ginal annotations. As soon as the first edition 
had passed the press at Geneva, the editors re- 
turned to England. 

Whittingham, soon after, went to France as 
chaplain to the British ambassador, the Earl of 
Bedford. On his return, he acted in the same 
capacity for the Earl of Warwick. Through the 
influence of that excellent nobleman, he was ap- 
pointed to the deanery of Durham, in 1563, not- 
withstanding his sturdy opposition to the popish 



* One of tlie old Protestant ministers preached a funeral ser- 
mon for her, on the text, — " Go, see now this cursed woman, and 
, bury her ; for she is a king's daughter." 2 Ki. ix. 34. When he 
was called in question for it, it was decided that the text was the 
most objectionable part of the sermon ! 



50 INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE , 

ceremonies retained in the Church of England. 
His abilities were so highly esteemed, that when 
the Secretary Cecil became, by promotion, Lord 
Treasurer Burleigh, the vacant secretaryship 
might have been taken by Mr. Whittingham, had 
he desired it. He was repeatedly impleaded in 
the ecclesiastical courts for his non-conformity, 
and for his presbyterial ordination at Geneva ; 
and he was once excommunicated by the Arch- 
bishop of York. On appeal to Queen Elizabeth, 
she appointed Henry, Earl of Huntington, who 
was Lord President of the Council of the North, 
and Di\ Hutton, Dean of York, as a commission 
to examine and decide the case. The Commission 
boldly declared, " that Mr. Whittingham was or- 
dained in a better sort than even the Archbishop 
himself. 5 ' Another attempt on the part of that 
dignitary succeeded no better. Before these pros- 
ecutions were ended, Mr. Whittingham died in 
possession of his benefice, in 1579, and in the 
sixty-fifth year of his age. He was buried in the 
cathedral at Durham. He was an eminently 
pious and powerful preacher, and an ornament to 
religion and learning, to which he greatly contrib- 
uted by his publications, and chiefly by his agency 
in the revision of the English Bible. He was 
the author of several of those metrical versions 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



51 



of the Psalms, which are still sung in the Epis- 
copal Churches of England and America, even 
as Tyndale's prose translations of the Psalms are 
still printed and read in the Book of Common 
Prayer.* 

Anthony Gilby, who was associated with Mr. 
Whittingham in preparing the Geneva Bible, was 
born in Lincolnshire, and educated in Christ's 
College, Cambridge, where he acquired a very 
exact and critical skill in the Latin, Greek, and 
Hebrew languages ; and became a bold reformer 
as to the habits, ceremonies, and corruptions of 
the national Church. When Queen Mary went 
about her bloody and burning work, he fled to the 
continent, tarrying most of his time at Geneva. 
Soon after the accession of Elizabeth to the 
throne, he went back to England, and was placed 
in the wealthy vicarage of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, 
where he lived "as great as a bishop." He was 
a "famous and reverend divine," and God won- 
derfully blessed his zealous and faithful ministry. 
He stood in the highest esteem with the best and 
noblest in the land, which did not screen him from 



* Thomas Sternhold, Jolm Hopkins, and Thomas Norton, who 
with "William Whittingham prepared the Psalms in metre, were 
all strongly puritanical men, and eminent in their day. 



52 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



being harassed for his non-conformity. He lived 
to a great age, but the time of his death is un- 
known. He was noted for a flaming zeal against 
the errors and abominations of papistry, and all 
the remnants and patches of it retained in the 
Church of England. 

The other helper of Mr. Whittingham at Ge- 
neva w r as Thomas Sampson, D. D., born about 
1517, and educated at Oxford. He was a stout 
Protestant and Puritan, and a very great scholar. 
In 1551, he became rector of Allhallows, Bread- 
street, London ; and next year Dean of Winches- 
ter. He continued a famous preacher of God's 
Word, till the death of King Edward. After that, 
he was obliged to live in concealment ; and at 
last, with great difficulty, escaped from his coun- 
try. At Geneva he found the best of employ- 
ments in aiding to perfect the Bible in English. 
On returning to England under the reign of Eliz- 
abeth, he was offered the bishopric of Norwich, 
and declined it from conscientious scruples. He 
was noted in the pulpit for his wonderful memory 
and fine elocution ; and was for several years one 
of the most popular court-preachers. In 1560, 
he became Dean of Christ Church, Oxford. The 
numerous men distinguished for their learning, 
and who were connected with that College, thus 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



53 



speak of him, in a letter soliciting his appoint- 
ment, — " After well considering all the learned 
men in the land, they found none to be compared 
to him for singular learning and great piety, hav- 
ing the praise of all men. And it is very doubt- 
ful whether there is a better man, a greater lin- 
guist, a more complete scholar, a more profound 
divine." In 1564, he was arraigned for non-con- 
formity before the odious High Commission Court, 
and deprived of his office, and confined. It was 
not without much trouble, that he procured his 
release. He was made Prebendary of Pancras in 
St. Paul's Cathedral in 1570. In 1573, having 
suffered some from a paralytic affection, he was 
appointed to the mastership of the Hospital at 
Leicester, a position of influence, w T here he made 
himself very useful for sixteen years, till his death 
in 1589, at the age of seventy-two. 

It is evident that these three companions in ex- 
ile were abundantly qualified for the w r ork of re- 
vising the translation, and publishing what for 
nearly eighty years was the favorite household 
Bible of the English nation. It was a wonderful 
providence of God, which drove those learned ex- 
iles abroad to give them the opportunity for 
making this improved translation, and prepared 
the way for its free introduction among the Eng 



54 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



lish people as soon as it was ready. Thus the 
persecution of the Scriptures, like that 

" Vaulting ambition which o'erleaps itself. 
And falls onth' other side," 

defeats its own object, and helps on what it would 
have destroyed. Hainan, while pursuing in his 
pride the destruction of the whole Jewish race, 
was elevated at least " fifty cubits" higher than 
he had ever thought or dreamt of ! 

During" the reign of Elizabeth, " whose inclina- 
tions," says Coleridge. " were as popish as her 
interests were protestant," the printing of English 
Bibles went on, at first, more by connivance than 
by royal approbation. Soon after she began to 
reign, a gentleman somewhat publicly said to her, 
that she had released many persons from unde- 
served confinement , but that there were still 
four prisoners of most excellent character, who 
craved liberation. On her asking who they were, 
the courtier replied, that they were the holy 
Evangelists, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John ; 
and he craved that they might have leave to walk 
abroad as formerly in the English tongue. To 
this the politic spinster replied, that she " would 
first know the minds of the prisoners, whether 
they desired any such liberty." But though the 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



55 



sovereign refrained from committing herself at 
the outset, the year 1561 had not expired, before 
new editions of the four versions of Tyndale, Co- 
verdale, Crammer, and the Geneva exiles, were 
in free circulation. 

It was in 1568, when Elizabeth had been queen 
for ten years, that the ** Bishop's Bible*' was pub- 
lished under the supervision of Parker, Archbishop 
of Canterbury. This text was most carefully re- 
vised by fifteen very learned men, the majority of 
whom were bishops ; and hence the name of the 
work. As each of these divines completed his 
share, the Archbishop gave to their labors a final 
revision. Thus the translation was still further 
perfected. This first imprint was the most splen- 
did that had ever been issued. It is a magnifi- 
cent folio, and contains nearly a hundred and fifty 
engravings. It has long been supposed that this 
revision was undertaken at the queen's command ; 
but such was not the case. It was eight times 
printed before the death of Parker in 1775 ; but 
was not appointed, like Cranmer's Bible, " to be 
read in churches." 

Up to this time, the Geneva Bible had been re 
peatedly printed on the continent, and mostly a„ 
Geneva itself; but not in England. Yet this was 
decidedly the 'people's Bible, and enjoyed the 



56 INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 

popular preference for domestic use. From that 
time, almost all the Bibles, for more than thirty- 
five years, were issued from the press of the Bar- 
kers, father and son; whereas previously it had 
afforded employment to a large number of differ- 
ent printers. While Elizabeth, " the throned 
vestal," was in all her glory, not less than one 
hundred and thirty different editions of the Bible 
and Testament were issued ; eighty-five of them 
being of the Bible, and forty-five of the Testa- 
ment. Of these editions ninety, or more than 
two-thirds, were of the Geneva version. Of the 
eighty-five issues of the entire Bible, sixty were 
of this latter version. The sale of so many cop- 
ies, and at tenfold higher prices than are paid 
now, was a " sign of the times," and evinced the 
growing eagerness of the nation for the precious 
Book of God. 

When James I. succeeded to the kingdom in 
1603, they who desired a thorough reformation in 
the Church of England, and against w x hom the 
terrible Elizabeth had ever " erected her lion- 
port," then indulged high hopes of obtaining their 
desires. His Presbyterian education, and the 
hypocritical professions he had made with real 
Stuart perfidy, had raised their hopes only to dash 
them more cruelly to the dust. He soon gave 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



57 



them to understand, that, in his view, " presby- 
tery and monarchy agreed together as well as 
God and the devil :" and loudly proclaimed his 
famous maxim of king-craft, — " No bishop, no 
king !" As he entered his new realm of Eng- 
land, he received what w r as called the " millena- 
ry petition," because it purported to bear the 
names of about a thousand ministers, though the 
exact number of signers is not known. The pe- 
tition craved reformation of sundry abuses in the 
worship, ministry, revenues, and discipline of the 
national Church. The Universities uttered their 
remonstrances against this petition. The king, 
who was eminently qualified to perform the lead- 
ing part in " the royal game of Goose," under- 
took to settle the business at a conference be- 
tween the parties, at which he was to moderate 
and decide. He sent out a proclamation, " touch- 
ing a meeting for the hearing, and for the deter- 
mining, things pretended to be amiss in the 
Church." This conference was held at Hampton 
Court, on the 14th, 16th, and 18th days of Janu- 
ary, 1604. On the part of the Puritans, the king 
summoned four of their divines, selected by him- 
self. To match them, he called nine bishops, as 
many cathedral clergymen, and four divinity pro- 
fessors from Cambridge and Oxford. It soon be- 



58 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



came manifest, that the only object of the meeting 
was to give the king an opportunity to declare 
his bitter hostility to the Puritans, who were 
brow-beaten, insulted, and trampled upon by the 
tyrant and his ghostly minions. The Puritans 
were confuted, " as bitter bishop Bale" said on 
another occasion, " with seven solid arguments, 
thus reckoned up, Authority, Violence, Craft, 
Fraud, Intimidation, Terror and Tyranny."* The 
monarch roundly declared that he would " harry 
out of the land" all who would not conform their 
consciences to his dictation. 

One good result, however, came from this 
" mock conference," as it was usually called by 
the oppressed Puritans. Among other of their 
demands, Dr. Reynolds, who was the chief speak- 
er in their behalf, requested that there might be 
a new translation of the Bible, without note or 
comment. In an account of the proceedings, 
given by Patrick Galloway, one of the King's 
Scotch chaplains, who was present, and whose 
account was corrected by the king's own hand, it 
is set forth as the second of the articles noted 



* In the nervous Latin of the crabbed ex-bishop of Ossory, 
the arguments run thus ; Authoritate, Yi, Arte, Fraude, Metu, 
Terrore et Tyrannide. 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



59 



among things to be reformed, and presented by 
Reynolds, — " That a translation be made of the 
whole Bible, as consonant as can be to the origin- 
al Hebrew and, Greek ; and this to be set out and 
printed, without any marginal notes, and only to 
be used in all churches of England, in time of 
divine service," To this demand the King ac- 
ceded ; but it was not till nearly six months after 
the Hampton Court Conference, that the selec- 
tion of scholars to undertake the work was made. 
Their labors began soon after, ana the first revis- 
ion of the sacred text by the whole company oc- 
cupied about four years. The second revision, 
by a committee of twelve of them, took up nine 
months more. The sheets were then some two 
years in passing through the press ; and the new 
and immortal version was finished and published 
In 1611, after seven years of most thorough and 
careful preparation. 

Thus it came to pass, that the English Bible 
received its present form, after a fivefold revision 
of the translation as it was left in 1537 by Tyndale 
and Rogers. During this interval of seventy-four 
years, it had been slowly ripening, till this last, 
most elaborate, and thorough revision under King 
James matured the work for coming centuries. It 
is a very great advantage, that the work, which 



60 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



was well done at first, had the benefit of this ac- 
cumulated labor and pious care bestowed upon it 
by so many zealous and erudite scholars in long 
succession. To this is to be ascribed much of its 
intrinsic excellence and lasting popularity. Its 
origin and history so strongly commended it, that 
it speedily came into general use as the standard 
version, by the common consent of the English 
people ; and required no act of parliament nor 
royal proclamation to establish its authority.* 
Some of the older versions continued to be re- 
printed for forty years ; but no long time elapsed 
ere the common version quietly and exclusively 
occupied the field. Who believes it possible that 
another translation can be produced in our time, 
which shall command the like acceptance ; and 
without strife or controversy, take, among the 



* Says Dr. Lee, Principal of the University of Edinburgh ; 
" I do not find that there was any canon, proclamation, or act 
of parliament, to enforce the use of it." " The present version,' ' 
says Dr. Symonds, as quoted in Anderson's Annals, " appears 
to have made its way, without the interposition of any author- 
ity whatsoever ; for it is not easy to discover any traces of a pro- 
clamation, canon or statute published to enforce the use of it." 
It has been lately ascertained, that neither the king's private 
purse, nor the public exchequer, contributed a farthing toward 
the expense of the translation or publication of the work. 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 61 

English-speaking population of the globe, the 
place now held by our venerable version ? 

This translation was completed at a fortunate 
time. The English language had passed through 
many and great changes, and had at last reached 
the very height of its purity and strength. The 
Bible has ever since been the grand English clas- 
sic. It is still the noblest monument of the pow- 
er of the English speech. It is the pattern and 
standard of excellence therein. It is the most 
full and refreshing of all the " wells of English 
undefiled." It has given a fixed character to our 
language. It is as intelligible now as when it 
was first imprinted ; and will be as easily under- 
stood by readers of coming centuries as by those 
of the past and the present. It is singularly free 
from what used to be called " ink-horn terms;" 
that is, such words as are more used in writing 
than in speaking, and are not well understood 
except by scholars. " In the church, among the 
congregation," says Luther, "we ought to speak 
as we use at home, in the house, — the plain 
mother-tongue, which every one understandeth 
and is acquainted withal." 

That King James's scholars wisely clave to the 
language of the cottage and the market-place, 
appears by what Thomas Fuller wrote of Notting- 



62 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



hamshire in 1662; " The language of the com- 
mon people is generally the best of any shire in 
England. A proof whereof, when a boy, I re- 
ceived from a hand-laboring man therein, which 
since hath convinced my judgment. 4 We speak, I 
believe,' said he, 'as good English as any shire in 
England; because, though in the singing-Psalms 
some words are used to make the metre, unknown 
to us, yet the last translation of the Bible, which 
no doubt was done by those learned men in the 
best English, agreeth perfectly with the common 
speech of our county.'" Thus we came to have 
a version as easy of comprehension as the nature 
of the case will admit. It is the most precious 
boon possessed by the vast masses, to whom it 
speaks "in their own tongue the w T onderful works 
of God." Well does the Translators' Preface 
speak of God's Sacred Word as " that inestimable 
treasure which excelleth all the riches of the 
earth." And well was it said of them by that 
same Thomas Fuller ; "These, with Jacob, roll- 
ed away the stone from the mouth of the well of 
life ; so that now even Rachels, weak women, may 
freely come, both to drink themselves, and water 
the flocks of their families at the same." 

But were those ancient scholars competent to 
make their translation correct, as well as plain ? 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



63 



This is a question of the utmost importance in 
estimating the value of their work, and the de- 
gree of confidence to which it is entitled among 
readers who cannot examine for themselves 
the original tongues of the inspired writers. It is. 
therefore, the principal object of this little volume 
to present brief biographical sketches of our 
Translators. By showing who were the men, 
and what were their qualifications for their work, 
we shall best enable the common reader to de- 
cide for himself, how far he may depend- upon 
their ability and fidelity. Considering the bound- 
less circulation and unapproachable popularity of 
their work, it seems most strange that no person, 
up to this time, — not even in the mother-country, 
— has attempted to do this, except in the most 
slight and compendious manner. 

As to the capability of those men, we may say 
again, that, bv the good providence of God, their 
work was undertaken in a fortunate time. Not 
only had the English language, that singular com- 
pound, then ripened to its full perfection, but the 
study of Greek, and of the oriental tongues, and 
of rabbinical lore, had then been carried to a 
greater extent in England than ever before or 
since. This particular field of learning has nev- 
er been so highly cultivated anions: English di- 



64 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



vines as it was at that day. To evince this fact, 
so far as necessary limits will admit, it will be 
requisite to sketch the characters and scholarship 
of those men, who have made all coming ages 
their debtors. When this pleasing task is done, 
it is confidently expected that the reader of these 
pages will yield to the conviction, that all the 
colleges of Great Britain and America, even in 
this proud day of boastings, could not brine to- 
gether the same number of divines equally quali- 
fied by learning and piety for the great underta- 
king. Few indeed are the living names worthy 
to be enrolled with those mighty men. It would 
be impossible to convene out of any one Christian 
denomination, or out of all, a body of translators, 
on whom the whole Christian community would 
bestow such confidence as is reposed upon that 
illustrious company, or who would prove them- 
selves as deserving of such confidence. Very 
many self-styled " improved versions" of the Bi- 
ble, or of parts of it, have been paraded before 
the world, but the religious public has doomed 
them all, without exception, to utter neglect. 

Xot that absolute perfection is claimed for our 
common English Bible. But this blessed book 
is so far complete and exact, that the unlearned 
reader, being of ordinary intelligence, may enjoy 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



65 



the delightful assurance, that, if he study it in 
faith and prayer, and give himself up to its teach- 
ings, he shall not be confounded or misled as to 
any matter essential to his salvation and his spi- 
ritual ffood. It will as safely guide him into all 
the things needful for faith and practice, as 
would the original Scriptures, if he could read 
them, or if they could speak to him as erst they 
s]Dake to the Hebrew in Jerusalem, or to the 
Greek in Corinth. Nor is this any disparage- 
ment of the benefits of a critical knowledge of 
the original tongues. For while a good transla- 
tion is the best commentary on the original 
Scriptures, the originals themselves are the best 
commentary on the translation. Passages some- 
what obscure in the translation often become 
very plain when we recur to the original, because 
we then distinctly see what it was that the trans- 
lators meant to say.* To one who can readily 

* Take an instance from Isai. v. 18. "Woe unto them that 
draw iniquity with cords of vanity, and sin as it were with a 
cart-rope." From the last member of this paraUelism has arisen 
the absnrd proverb for a high-handed transgressor, — " He sinned 
with a cart-rope !" On recurring to the Hebrew, we find that 
" sin" is not a verb but a noun, standing in apposition with 
** draw," as iniquity does in the preceding clause. So that 
the full expression of the last clause would be, — " and that draw 
sin as it were with a cart-rope," — thus drudging in the harness 
of sin. 



66 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



understand both, the original must, in the nature 
of the case, always be the easier of the two ; just 
as it is easier for a man to walk by the sight of 
his own eyes, than by the guidance of another 
man's eyes. It is only maintained, that the com- 
mon English reader enjoys, by the good provi- 
dence of God, that which conies the nearest to 
the privilege of the classical scholar; and has a 
translation so exact, plain, and trustworthy, that 
he may follow it with implicit confidence as " a 
light to his feet and a lamp to his paths." 

The King was for appointing fifty-four learned 
men to this great and good work ; but the num- 
ber actually employed upon it, in the first in- 
stance, was forty-seven. Order was also taken, 
that the bishops, in their several dioceses, should 
find what men of learning there were, who might 
be able to assist ; and the bishops were to write 
to them, earnestly charging them, at the king's 
desire, to send in their suggestions and critical 
observations, that so, as his Majesty remarks, 
" our said intended translation may have the help 
and furtherance of all our principal learned men 
within this our kingdom." 

Seventeen of the translators were to work at 
Westminster, fifteen at Cambridge, and as many 
at Oxford. Those who met at each place were 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE . 



07 



divided into two companies ; so that there Were, 
in all, six distinct companies of translators. They 
received a set of rules for their direction. The 
first instructed them to make the " Bishop's Bi- 
ble/' so called, the basis of their work, altering 
it no further than fidelity to the originals required. 
Tn the result, however, the new version agreed 
much more with the Geneva than with any other ; 
though the huffing king, at the Hampton Court 
Conference, reproached it as "the worst of all." 
The second rule requires that the mode then used 
of spelling the proper names should be retained 
as far as might be. The third rule requires " the 
old ecclesiastical words to be kept," such as 
" church " instead of " congregation." The fourth 
rule prescribes, that where a word has different 
meanings, that is to be preferred which has the 
general sanction of the most ancient Fathers, 
regard being had to '* the propriety of the place, 
and the analogy of faith." The fifth rule directs 
that the divisions into chapters be altered as little 
as may be. The sixth rule, agreeably to Dr. 
Reynolds's wise suggestion at Hampton Court, 
prohibits all notes or comments, thus obliging the 
translators to make their version intelligible with- 
out those dangerous helps. The seventh rule pro- 
vides for marginal references to parallel or ex- 



68 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



planatory passages. The eighth rule enjoins that 
each man in each company shall separately exam- 
ine the same chapter or chapters, and put the 
translation into the best shape he can. The whole 
company must then come together, and compare 
what they have done, and agree on what shall 
stand. Thus in each company, according to the 
number of members, there would be from seven 
to ten distinct and carefully labored revisions, 
the whole to be compared, and digested into one 
copy of the portion of the Bible assigned to each 
particular company. The ninth rule directs, that 
as fast as any company shall, in this manner, com- 
plete any one of the sacred books, it is to be sent 
to each of the other companies, to be critically 
reviewed by them all. The tenth rule prescribes, 
that if any company, upon reviewing a book so 
sent to them, find any thing doubtful or unsatis- 
factory, they are to note the places, and their 
reasons for objecting thereto, and send it back to 
the company from whence it came. If that com- 
pany should not concur in the suggestions thus 
made, the matter was to be finally arranged at a 
general meeting of the chief persons of all the 
companies at the end of the work. Thus every 
part of the Bible would be fully considered, first, 
separately, by each member of the company to 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



69 



which it was originally assigned ; secondly, by 
that whole company in concert ; thirdly, by the 
other five companies severally ; and fourthly, by 
the general committee of revision. By this ju- 
dicious plan, each part must have been closely 
scrutinized at least fourteen times. The eleventh 
rule provides, that in case of any special difficulty 
or obscurity, letters shall be issued by authority 
to any learned man in the land, calling for his 
judgment thereon. The twelfth rule requires 
every bishop to notify the clergy of his diocese 
as to the work in hand, and to " move and charge 
as many as, being skilful in the tongues, have 
taken pains in that kind, to send his particular 
observations " to some one of the companies. 
The thirteenth rule appoints the directors of the 
different companies. The fourteenth rule names 
five other translations to be used, " when they 
agree better with the text than the Bishop's Bi- 
ble." These are Tyndale's ; — Matthew's, which 
is by Tyndale and John Rogers ; — Coverdale's ; 
— Whitchurch's, which is " Cranmer's," or the 
" Great Bible,'' and was 'printed by Whitchurch ; 
— and the Geneva Bible. The object of this regu- 
lation was to avoid, as far as possible, the suspi- 
cious stamp of novelty. To the careful observ 
ance of these injunctions, which, with the excep 



70 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



tion of the first five, are highly judicious, is to 
be ascribed much of the excellence of the com- 
pleted translation. 

To these rules, which were delivered to the 
Translators, there appears to have been added 
another, providing that, besides the directors of 
the six companies, " three or four of the most 
ancient and grave divines in either of the Univer- 
sities, not employed in translating," be designated 
by the Vice-Chancellors and Heads of Colleges, 
" to be overseers of the Translation, as well He- 
brew as Greek, for the better observation of the 
fourth rule." 

The learned Selden says, that when the Trans- 
lators met to compare what they had done, each 
of them held in his hand a Bible in some lan- 
guage. If any thing struck any one as requiring 
alteration, he spoke ; otherwise the reading w T ent 
on. The final revision w r as made, not by six 
men, as the tenth of the above rules would seem 
to indicate, but by twelve. At least, such was 
the statement made in the Synod of Dort in 1618, 
by Dr. Samuel Ward, who was one of the most 
active of the Translators. It seems to have beeiu 
carried through the press by Dr. Miles Smith and 
Bishop Bilson, aided perhaps by Archbishop Ban- 
croft and other prelates. All the expense of 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE • 



71 



making and printing the translation was defrayed 
by Robert Barker, ''Printer to the King's most 
Excellent Maiestie." The copy-right thus cost 
him three thousand five hundred pounds ; and his 
heirs and assigns retained their privilege down to 
the year 1709. For two hundred and forty years 
and more, God has been speaking by this pre- 
cious volume to the multitudes of the Anglo- 
Saxon race. Popery, apparently believing that 
ignorance is the mother of devotion, and espe- 
cially ignorance of the Word of God, would fain 
have supplanted it by priestly inventions and 
monkish corruptions. 

"But to outweigh, all harm, the Sacred Book, 
In dusty sequestration wrapt too long, 
Assumes the accents of our native tongue ; 
And he who guides the plow, or wields the crook, 
With, understanding spirit now may look 
Upon her records, listen to her song, 
And sift her laws, — much wondering that the wrong, 
Which, faith has suffered, Heaven could calmly brook, 
Transcendant boon ! noblest that earthly king 
Ever bestowed to equalize and bless 
Under the weight of mortal wretchedness." 

The printing of the English Bible has proved 
to be by far the mightiest barrier ever reared to 
repel the advance of Popery, and to damage all 
the resources of the Papacy. Originally intend 



72 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



ed for the five or six millions who dwelt within 
the narrow limits of the British Islands, it at once 
formed and fixed their language, till then unset- 
tled ; and has since gone with that language to 
the isles and shores of every sea. " And now, 
during the lapse of almost two and a half centu- 
ries, it has gladdened the hearts, and still glad- 
dens the hearts of millions upon millions, not 
only in Great Britain, but throughout North 
America and the Indies, in portions of Africa, 
and in Australia. At the present day, the Eng- 
lish is probably the vernacular tongue of more 
millions than of any other one language under 
heaven ; and the English Bible has brought and 
still brings home the knowledge of God's revealed 
truth to myriads more of minds than ever re- 
ceived it through the original tongues. The 
Translators little foresaw the vast results and 
immeasurable influence of what they had thus 
done, both for time and for eternity. Venerated 
men ! their very names are now hardly knoion to 
more than a few persons ; yet, in the providence 
of God, the fruits of their labors have spread to 
far distant climes ; have laid broad and deep the 
foundations of mighty empires ; have afforded to 
multitudes strength to endure adversity, and 
grace to resist the temptations of prosperity ; 



INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE. 



73 



and only the revelations of the judgment-day can 
disclose how many millions and millions, through 
the instrumentality of their labors, have been 
made wise unto salvation.* 

Surely it is time, that the names of these 
"venerated men" were rescued from such unjust 
oblivion ; and that at least some considerable 
part of those who have received such incalcula- 
ble benefits at their hands, should know to whom 
they are so deeply indebted. The sensation of 
gratitude is one of pleasure ; and it is hoped that 
this little book may serve to awaken it in many 
a bosom, both toward the men who wrought so 
good a work, " and made all coming ages their 
own," — and toward Him who gave them their 
skill, and the opportunity to exert it in thus wide- 
ly diffusing his saving truth. 



* Report of the Committee on Versions, made to the Board ot 
Managers of the American Bible Society, and adopted May 1st, 
1851. 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



Having thus traced the history of our Common 
Version, through the successive steps by which it 
nas come down to us in its present shape, it re- 
mains for us to inquire as to the persons w T ho 
put the finishing hand to the work, and to satisfy 
ourselves as to their qualifications for the task. 
It is obvious that this personal investigation is ol 
the utmost importance in settling the degree of 
confidence to which their labors are entitled. 
Unless it can be proved that they were, as a 
body, eminently fitted to do this work as it ought 
to be done, it can have no claim to be regarded 
as a "finality" in the matter of furnishing a 
translation of the Word of God for the English 
speaking populations of the globe. 



76 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



It is exceedingly strange that a question of 
such obvious importance lias been so long left 
almost unnoticed. Numerous histories of the 
Translation itself have been drawn up with great 
labor; but no man seems to have thought it 
worth his while to give any account of the 
Translators, except the most meagre notices of a 
few of them, and general attestations to their rep- 
utations, in their own time, for such scholarship 
and skill as their undertaking required. Even 
the late excellent Christopher Anderson, in his 
huge volumes, replete as they are with research 
and information upon the minutest points relating 
to his subject, allots but a page or two of his 
smallest type to this essential branch of it. 

It is nearly twenty years since the writer of 
these pages began to consider the desirableness 
of knowing more of those eminent divines, and 
he has ever since pursued a zealous search 
wherever he was likely to effect any " restitution 
of decayed intelligence" respecting them. At 
first, he almost despaired of ascertaining much 
more than the bare names of most of them. But 
by degrees he has collected innumerable scraps 
of information, gathered from a great variety of 
sources ; amply sufficient, with due arrangement, 
to illustrate the subject. His object is simply to 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



77 



shew, that the Translators commissioned by 
James Stuart were ripe and critical scholars, pro- 
foundly versed in all the learning required ; and 
that, in these particulars, there has never yet 
been a time when a better qualified company 
could have been collected for the purpose. 

Of the forty-seven, who acted under king 
James's commission, some are almost unknown 
at this day, though of high repute in their own 
time. A few have left us but little more than 
their names, worthy of immortal remembrance, 
were it only for their connection with this noble 
monument of learning and piety. But their 
being associated with so many other scholars and 
divines of the greatest eminence, is proof that 
they were deemed to be fit companions for the 
brightest lights of the land. This is confirmed 
by the fact that, though the king designed to 
employ in this work the highest and ripest talents 
in his realm, there were still many men in Eng- 
land distinguished for their learning, like Brousrh- 
ton and Bedell, who were not enrolled on the 
list of translators. It is but just to conclude, 
therefore, that even such as are now less known 
to us, were then accounted to deserve a place 
with the best. What we may know of the 
greater part of them, must lead to the highest 



78 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



estimate of the whole body of these good men. 
The catalogue begins with one whose name is 
worthy of t-he place it fills. 



LANCELOT ANDREWS. 

He was born at London, in 1565. He was 
trained chiefly at Merchant Taylor's school, in 
his native city, till he was appointed to one of 
the first Greek Scholarships of Pembroke Hall, 
in the University of Cambridge. Once a year, 
at Easter, he used to pass a month with his pa- 
rents. During this vacation, he would find a 
master, from whom he learned some language 
to which he was before a stranger. In this 
way after a few years, he acquired most of the 
modern languages of Europe. At the Univer- 
sity, he gave himself chiefly to the Oriental 
tongues and to divinity. When he became 
candidate for a fellowship, there was but one 
vacancy ; and he had a powerful competitor in 
Dr. Dove, who was afterwards Bishop of Peter- 
borough. After long and severe examination, 
the matter was decided in favor of Andrews. 
But Dove, though vanquished, proved himself 



LANCELOT ANDREWS. 79 

in this trial so fine a scholar, that the College, 
unwilling to lose him, appointed him as a sort 
of supernumerary Fellow. Andrews also re- 
ceived a complimentary appointment as Fellow 
of Jesus College, in the University of Oxford. In 
his own College, he was made a catechist ; that 
is to say, a lecturer in divinity. 

His conspicuous talents soon gained him power- 
ful patrons. Henry, Earl of Huntingdon, took him 
into the North of England ; where he was the 
means of converting many papists by his preach- 
ing and disputations. He was also warmly be- 
friended by Sir Francis Walsingham, Secretary 
of State to Queen Elizabeth. He was made 
parson of Alton, in Hampshire ; and then Yicar 
of St. Giles, in London. He was afterwards 
made Prebendary and Canon Residentiary of St. 
Paul's, and also of the Collegiate Church of 
Southwark. He lectured on divinity at St. 
Paul's three times each week. On the death of 
Dr. Fulke, in 1589, Dr. Andrews, though so 
young, was chosen Master of Pembroke Hall, 
where he had received his education. While at 
the head of this College, he was one of its 
principal benefactors. It was rather poor at 
that time, but by his efforts its endowments 
were much increased ; and at his death, many 



80 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



years later, he bequeathed to it, besides some 
plate, three hundred folio volumes, and a thou- 
sand pounds to found two fellowships. 

He gave up his Mastership to become chap- 
lain in ordinary to Queen Elizabeth, who de- 
lighted in his preaching, and made him Preben- 
dary of Westminster, and afterwards Dean of 
that famous church. In the matter of Church 
dignities and preferments, he was highly favor- 
ed. It w r as wmile he held the office of Dean of 
Westminster, that Dr. Andrews w 7 as made direc- 
tor, or president, of the first company of Trans- 
lators, composed of ten members, who held their 
meetings at Westminster. The portion assigned 
to them was the five books of Moses, and the his- 
torical books to the end of the Second Book of 
Kings. Perhaps no part of the work is better 
executed than this. 

With King James, Dr. Andrews stood in still 
higher favor than he had done with Elizabeth. 
The " royal pedant " had published a " Defence 
of the Rights of Kings," in opposition to the arro- 
gant claims of the Popes. He was answered 
most bitterly by the celebrated Cardinal Bellar- 
mine. The King set Dr. Andrews to refute the 
Cardinal ; which he did in a learned and spirited 
quarto, highly commended by Casaubon. To 



LANCELOT ANDREWS. 



81 



that quarto, the Cardinal made no reply. For 
this service, the King rewarded his champion, by 
making him Bishop of Chichester ; to which 
office Dr. Andrews was consecrated, November 
3d, 1605. This was soon after his appointment 
to be one of the Translators of the Bible. He 
accepted the bishopric with great humility, having 
already refused that dignity more than once. 
The motto graven on his episcopal seal was the 
solemn exclamation, — " And who is sufficient for 
these things !" At this time he was also made 
Lord Almoner to the King, a place of great trust, 
in which he proved himself faithful and uncorrupt. 
In September, 1609, he was transferred to the 
bishopric of Ely ; and was called to his Majes- 
ty's privy council. In February, 1618, he was 
translated to the bishopric of AYinchester ; which 
if less dignified than the archiepiscopal see of 
Canterbury, was then much more richly endow- 
ed ; so that it used to be said, — " Canterbury is 
the higher rack, but Winchester is the better 
manger." At t-he time of this last preferment 
Dr. Andrews was appointed Dean of the King's cha- 
pel ; and these stations he retained till his death. 

In the high offices Bishop Andrews filled, he 
conducted himself with great ability and integ- 
rity. The crack-brained king, who scarce knew 



82 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



now to restrain his profaneness and levity under 
the most serious circumstances, was overawed 
by the gravity of this prelate, and desisted from 
mirth and frivolity in his presence. And yet the 
good bishop knew how to be facetious on occa- 
sion. Edmund Waller, the poet, tells of being 
once at court, and overhearing a conversation 
held by the king with Bishop Andrews, and 
Bishop Neile, of Durham. The monarch, who 
was always a jealous stickler for his prerogatives, 
and something more, was in those days trying to 
raise a revenue without parliamentary authority. 
In these measures, so clearly unconstitutional, he 
was opposed by Bishop Andrews with dignity and 
decision. Waller says, the king asked this brace 
of bishops, — " My lords, cannot I take my sub- 
ject's money when I want it, without all this for- 
mality in parliament ?" The Bishop of Durham, 
one of the meanest of sycophants to his prince, 
and a harsh and haughty oppressor of his puritan 
clergy, made ready answer, — " God forbid, Sir, 
but you should ; you are the breath of our nos- 
trils !" Upon this the king looked at the Bishop 
of Winchester, — " Well, my lord, what say you ?" 
Dr. Andrews replied evasively, — " Sir, I have no 
skill to judge of parliamentary matters." But 
the king persisted, — " No put offs, my lord ! an- 



LANCELOT ANDREWS. 



83 



swer me presently." " Then,- Sir," said the 
shrewd Bishop, " T think it lawful for you to 
take my brother Neile's money, for he offers it." 
Even the petulant king was hugely pleased 
with this piece of pleasantry, which gave great 
amusement to his cringing courtiers. 

© © 

" For the benefit of the afflicted," as the ad- 
vertisements have it, we give a little incident 
which may afford a useful hint to some that need 
it. While Dr. Andrews was one of the divines 
at Cambridge, he was applied to by a worthy 
alderman of that drowsy city, who was beset by 
the sorry habit of sleeping under the afternoon 
sermon ; and who, to his great mortification, had 
been publicly rebuked by the minister of the par- 
ish. As snuff had not then came into vogue, Dr. 
Andrews did not advise, as some matter-of-fact 
persons have done in such cases, to titillate the 
" sneezer" with a rousing pinch. He seems to 
have been of the opinion of the famous Dr. Ro- 
maine, who once told his full-fed congregation in 
London, that it was hard work to preach to two 
pounds of beef and a pot of porter. So Dr. An- 
drews advised his civic friend to help his wake- 
fulness by dining very sparingly. The advice 
was followed ; but without avail. Again the ro- 
tund dignitary slumbered and slept in his pew ; 



84 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



and again was he roused by the harsh rebukes of 
the irritated preacher. With tears in those too 
sleepy eyes of his, the mortified alderman re- 
paired to Dr. Andrews, begging for further coun- 
sel. The considerate divine, pitying his infirmity, 
recommended to him to dine as usual, and then 
to take his nap before repairing to his pew. 
This plan was adopted ; and to the next dis- 
course, which was a violent invective prepared 
for the very purpose of castigating the alder- 
man's somnolent habit, he listened with unwink 
ing eyes, and his uncommon vigilance gave quite 
a ridiculous air to the whole business. The un- 
happy parson was nearly as much vexed at his 
huge-waisted parishioner's unwonted wakeful- 
ness, as before at his unseemly dozing. 

Bishop Andrews continued in high esteem 
with Charles I. ; and that most culpable of mon- 
archs, whose only redeeming quality was the 
strength and tenderness of his domestic affec- 
tions, in his dying advice to his children, advised 
them to study the writings of three divines, of 
whom our Translator was one. 

Lancelot Andrews died at Winchester House, 
in Southwark, London, September 25th, 1626, 
aged sixty-one years. He w^as buried in the 
Church of St. Saviour, where a fair monument 



LANCELOT ANDREWS. 85 

marks the spot. Having never married, he be- 
queathed his property to benevolent uses. John 
Milton, then but a youth, wrote a glowing Latin 
elegy on his death. 

As a preacher, Bishop Andrews was right 
famous in his day. He was called the " star of 
preachers." Thomas Fuller says that he was "an 
inimitable preacher in his w^ay ; and such pla- 
giarists as have stolen his sermons could never 
steal his preaching, and could make nothing of 
that, whereof he made all things as he desired." 
Pious and pleasant Bishop Felton, his contempo- 
rary and colleague, endeavored in vain in his 
sermons tc assimilate to his style, and therefore 
said merrily of himself, — " I had almost marred 
my own natural trot by endeavoring to imitate 
his artificial amble." Let this be a warning to 
all who w r ould fain play the monkey, and espe- 
cially to such as would ape the eccentricities of 
genius. Nor is it desirable that Bishop Andrews' 
style shonld be imitated even successfully ; for it 
abounds in quips, quirks, and puns, according to 
the false taste of his time. Few writers are " so 
happy as to treat on matters which must always 
interest, and to do it in a manner which shall for 
ever jplease." To build up a solid literary repu- 
tation, taste and judgment in composition are as 



86 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



necessary as learning and strength of thought. 
The once admired folios of Bishop Andrews have 
Jong been doomed to the dusty dignity of the 
lower shelf in the library. 

Many hours he spent each day in private and 
family devotions ; and there were some who used 
to desire that " they might end their days in 
Bishop Andrews's chapel." He was one in 
whom was proved the truth of Luther's saying, 
that " to have prayed well, is to have studied 
well." His manual for his private devotions, pre- 
pared by himself, is wholly in the Greek lan- 
guage. It has been translated and printed. 
This praying prelate also abounded in alms-giv- 
ing ; usually sending his benefactions in private, 
as from a friend who chose to remain unknown. 
He was exceedingly liberal in his gifts to poor 
and deserving scholars. His own instructors he 
held in the highest reverence. His old school- 
master Mulcaster always sat at the upper end of 
the episcopal table ; and when the venerable ped- 
agogue was dead, his portrait was placed over the 
bishop's study door. These were just tokens of 
respect ; 

" For if the scholar to such height did reach, 
Then what was he who did that scholar teach ?" 



LANCELOT ANDREWS. 



87 



This worthy diocesan was much " given to 
hospitality," and especially to literary strangers. 
So bountiful was his cheer, that it used to be 
said, — " My lord of Winchester keeps Christmas 
all the year round." He once spent three thou- 
sand pounds in three days, though " in this we 
praise him not," in entertaining King James at 
Farnham Castle. His society was as much 
sought, however, for the charm of his rich and 
instructive conversation, as for his liberal house- 
keeping and his exalted stations. 

But we are chiefly concerned to know what 
were his qualifications as a Translator of the Bi- 
ble. He ever bore the character of " a right 
godly man," and " a prodigious student." One 
competent judge speaks of him as " that great 
gulf of learning !" It was also said, that " the 
world wanted learning to know how learned this 
man was." And a brave old chronicler remarks, 
that, such was his skill in all languages, espe- 
cially the Oriental, that, had he been present at 
the confusion of tongues at Babel, he might have 
served as Interpreter- General ! In his funeral 
sermon by Dr. Buckeridge, Bishop of Rochester, 
it is said that Dr. Andrews was conversant with 
fifteen languages. 



88 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



JOHN OVERALL. 

This divine is the next on the list of those 
good men, of whom the marginal comment in 
the Popish translation says, — " They will be ab- 
horred in the depths of hell !" They may be 
abhorred there, bnt, after a while no where else. 
He was born in 1559, at Hadley, and was bred 
in the free school at that place. He lived through 
the whole of that happy period, which many, 
beside the bard of Rydal Mount, regard as the 
best days of old England, 

" When faith and hope were in their prime, 
In great Eliza's golden time." 

In due season, he was entered as a scholar at 
St. John's College, Cambridge. He was next 
chosen Fellow of Trinity College, in the same 
University. In 1596, he was made King's Pro- 
fessor of Divinity ; and at the same time took his 
doctor's degree, being about thirty-seven years 
of age. It is noted of this eminent theologian by 
Bishop Hacket, that it was his custom to ground 
his theses in the schools on two or three texts of 
Scripture, shewing what latitude of opinion or 
interpretation was admissible upon the point in 



JOHN OVERALL. 



89 



hand. He was celebrated for the appropriate- 
ness of his quotations from the Fathers. He was 
soon after made Master of Catharine Hall very 
much against his will. To end a bitter conten- 
tion in regard to two rival candidates, he was 
elected, if election it could be called, under the 
Queen's absolute mandate. When Archbishop 
Whitgift wished the new Master "joy of his 
place," the latter replied that it was " terminus 
diminuens ;" which is Latin for " an Irish promo- 
tion," or a " hoist down hill." But his Grace, in 
the true spirit of a courtier " all of the olden 
time," told the dissatisfied Professor, that " if 
the injuries, much more the less courtesies, of 
princes must be thankfully taken, as the ushers 
to make way for greater favors." These appoint- 
ments must be taken as full proof of Dr. Overall's 
superior scholarship in that learned age, when 
such preferments were only won by dint of the 
severest application to study. 

In 1601, on the recommendation of Lord 
Brooke, that noble friend and patron of men of 
learning and genius, Dr. Overall was made Dean 
of St. Paul's, in London. It may be doubted 
whether this studious recluse, absorbed in deep 
studies, shone with his brightest lustre in the 
pulpit. " Being appointed," says Thomas Ful 



90 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



ler, " to preach before the Queen, he professed 
to my father, who was most intimate with him, 
that he had spoken Latin so long, it w x as trouble- 
some to him to speak English in a continued 
oration." 

Soon after the throne was filled by James the 
First, whom that accomplished statesman, the 
Duke of Sully, called " the most learned fool in 
Europe," the Convocation, or parliament of the 
clergy, came together. Dr. Overall was prolocu- 
tor, or speaker, of the lower house of Convoca- 
tion. To this body he presented a volume of 
canons, the only book from his pen now extant. 
Its object was to vindicate the divine right of 
government. But though it was adopted by the 
Convocation, the King prevented the publication 
of the book at that time, because it taught, that 
when, after a revolution or conquest, a new gov- 
ernment or dynasty was firmly established, this 
also, in its turn, could plead for itself a divine 
right, and could claim the obedience of the peo- 
ple as a matter of duty toward God. This " Con- 
vocation Book," now so long forgotten, was print- 
ed many years after the death of " King Jamie;" 
and obtained some historical-and political celeb- 
rity, because it had the very effect which was 
apprehended by the monarch who suppressed it. 



JOHN OVERALL. 



91 



For when his grandson, James the Second, was 
expelled from the soil and throne of England, 
many bishops and other clergymen, called " non- 
jurors," refused through conscientious scruples, 
to swear allegiance to the new government of 
William and Mary. Bishop Sherlock and many 
others, w T ho at first declined the oath, professed 
to be converted from that error by the reading 
of Dr. Overall's book. But conversions so favor- 
able to thrift are apt to be held in suspicion. 
Dr. Overall was the author of the questions and 
answers relating to the sacraments, which have 
been much admired, by the ablest judges of such 
matters, and which were subjoined to the Cat- 
echism of the Church of England, in the first 
year of James the First. 

It was while he was Dean of St. Paul's Cathe- 
dral, that he was joined in the" commission, the 
highest of his honors, for translating the Bible. 
Though long familiarity with other languages 
may have made him somewhat inapt for continu- 
ous public discourse in his mother-tongue, he w^as 
thereby the better fitted to discern the sense of 
the sacred original. He was styled by Cam- 
den " a prodigious learned man ;" and is said by 
Fuller to have been "of a strong brain to improve 
his great reading." 



92 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



John Overall, who " carried superintendency in 
his surname," was made Bishop of Litchfield and 
Coventry, in 1614. Four years later he was 
transferred to the see of Norwich, where, in a 
few months, he died, at the age of sixty }^ears. 
This was in 1619. He frequently had in his 
mouth the words of the Psalmist, — "When thou 
with rebukes dost correct man for iniquity, thou 
makest his beauty to consume away like a moth ; 
surely every man is vanity." 

In his later years, he was unhappily inclined to 
Arminianism. He was a correspondent of Vos- 
sius and Grotius, and other famous scholars on 
the continent. He was greatly addicted to the 
scholastic theology, now so much decried. Since 
the days of Bacon the schoolmen have been much 
depreciated, because there was so little practical 
fruit of their studies. And yet there was some- 
thing wonderful in the keenness and subtlety of 
their disputes ; though it is lawful to smile at the 
excess of logical refinement which subdivided 
the stream of their genius into a ramification of 
rills, absorbed at last in the dry desert of meta- 
physics. One of them is highly praised by Car- 
dan, " for that only one of his arguments was 
enough to puzzle all posterity ; and that when he 
was grown old, he wept because he could not un- 



HADRIAN SARAVIA. 93 

derstand his own books." We can conceive, how- 
ever, that the refinement of the schoolmen as to 
precise definitions, and nicer shades of thought, 
might be a valuable quality in some, at least, ot 
the company of Translators. 



HADRIAN SARAVIA. 



This noted scholar was a Belgian by birth. 
His father was a Spaniard, his mother was a 
Belgian, and both were Protestants. He was 
born in 1530, at Hedin in Artois. Of his early 
life no notices have reached us. He was, for 
some years, a pastor both in Flanders and Hol- 
land. He was, in his principles, a terrible high- 
church-man ; and seems, from his zeal for the 
divine right of episcopacy, to have had some 
trouble with his colleagues and the magistrates 
at Ghent, where he was one of the ministers in 
1566. From that place he retired to England. 
He was sent by Queen Elizabeth's Council as a 
sort of missionary to the islands of Guernsey and 
Jersey, where he was one of the first Protestant 



94 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



ministers ; knowing, as he says of himself, in a 
letter, " which were the beginnings, and by what 
means and occasions the preaching of God's 
word was planted there." He labored there in a 
twofold capacity, doing the work of an evange- 
list, and conducting a newly established school, 
called Elizabeth College. 

From his island-home, he was recalled to the 
continent by the Belgian churches, in 1577. He 
was invited to become Professor of Divinity at the 
University of Leyden, in 1582 ; and soon after 
was also made preacher of the French Church 
m that city. In 1587 he came to England with 
the Earl of Leicester, and bectime master of the 
grammar-school m Southampton, where, in the 
course of a few years, he trained many distin- 
guished pupils. 

His zeal for episcopacy led him to publish 
several Latin treatises against Beza, Danseus, and 
other Presbyterians. He also published a trea- 
tise on papal primacy against the Jesuit Gretser. 
All his publications relate to such matters, and 
were collected into a folio edition, in the year 
1611. They are still highly praised by the "Ox- 
ford divines," who have given occasion to Mac- 
au! ey to say, in his caustic style,—" The glory 
of being further behind the age than any other 



HADRIAN SARA VIA. 95 

class of the British people, is one which that 
learned body acquired early, and has never lost." 

In 1590, Saravia was made Doctor of Divinity 
at Oxford, as had been done long before at the 
University of Leyden. He was made Prebendary 
of Gloucester next of Canterbury, in 1695 ; and 
then of Westminster in 1601 . This last was his 
highest preferment. He added to it the rector- 
ship of Great Chart, in Kent, some eight years 
after. He died at Canterbury, January 15th, 
1612, aged eighty-two years. Thus his fluctuat- 
ing life ended in a quiet old age, and a peaceful 
death. 

He is said, by Anthony a- Wood, to have been 
" educated in all kinds of literature in his young- 
er days, especially in several languages." It 
was his fortune to find friends and patrons among 
the great. Archbishop Whitgift, that stern sup- 
pre'ssor of Puritanism, held him in high esteem, 
and made great use of his aid in conducting his 
share m the controversies of the time. In par- 
ticular the arch-prelate relied much on Dr. Sa- 
ravia's " Hebrew learning " in his contests with 
Hugh Broughton, that stiff Puritan, whom Light- 
foot styles " the great Albionean divine, re- 
nowned in many nations for rare skill in Salem's 
and Athen's tongues, and familiar acquaintance 



96 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



with all Rabbinical learning." Thus the Preben- 
dary of Westminster was accustomed to cross 
swords with no mean adversaries ; and was, no 
doubt, thoroughly furnished with the knowledge 
necessary for a Bible translator. 

While Dr. Saravia was Prebendary of Canter- 
bury, the famous Richard Hooker was parson of 
the village of Borne, about three miles distant. 
Between these worthies there sprang up a friend- 
ship, cemented by the agreement of their views 
and studies. Professor Keble says, that Saravia 
was Hooker's "confidential adviser," while the 
latter was preparing his celebrated books " Of the 
Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity." Old Izaak Walton 
gives the following beautiful picture of their Chris- 
tian intimacy ; — "These two excellent persons 
began a holy friendship, increasing daily to so 
high and mutual affections, that their two wills 
seemed to be but one and the same ; and their 
designs, both for the glory of God, and peace of 
the church, still assisting and improving each 
other's virtues, and the desired comforts of a 
peaceable piety." 



RICHARD CLARKE JOHN LAIFIELD. 



97 



RICHARD CLARKE. 

Dr. Clarke is spoken of as a Fellow of Christ's 
College, Cambridge ; and as a very learned 
clergyman and eminent preacher. He was Vicar 
of Minster and Monkton in Thanet, and one of the 
six preachers of the cathedral church in Can- 
terbury. He died in 1634. Three years after 
his death, a folio volume of his learned sermons 
was published. But alas for " folios" and " learn- 
ed sermons" in these days. When people look 
on such a thing, they are ready to exclaim, like 
Robert Hall, at the sight of Dr. Gill's volumin- 
ous Commentary, — " What a continent of mud !" 



JOHN LAIFIELD. 

Dr. Laifield was Fellow of Trinity College, Cam- 
bridge, and Rector of the Church of St. Cle- 
ment's, Dane's, in London. Of him it is said, 
" that being skilled in architecture, his judgment 
was much relied on for the fabric of the tab- 
ernacle and temple." He died at his rectory in 
1617. Few things are more difficult, than the 
giving of architectural details in such a manner as 

to be intelligible to the unprofessional reader. 
5 



98 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



ROBERT TIGHE. 

This name, in all the printed lists of the 
Translators, has been misspelled Leigh. It should 
be Teigh or Tighe* Dr. Tighe was born at 
Deeping, Lincolnshire ; and was educated part- 
ly at Oxford, and partly at Cambridge. He 
was Archdeacon of Middlesex and Vicar of the 
Church of All Hallows, Barking, London. He 
is characterized as " an excellent textuary and 
profound linguist." Dr. Tighe died in 1620, 
leaving to his son an estate of one thousand 
pounds a year ; which is worth mentioning be- 
cause so rarely done by men of the clerical 
profession. 



FRANCIS BURLEIGH. 

Dr. Burleigh, or Burghley, was made Yicar of 
Bishop's Stortford in 1590, which benefice he 
held at the time of his appointment to the im- 
portant service of this Bible translation. 

* See Le Neve's Fast Eccles. Ang. P. 194. Also Wood's 
Athene?, who adds,— " linguist," and " therefore employed in the 
Translation of the Bible." 



GEOFFRY KING . 



RICHARD THOMPSON. 



99 



GEOFFRY KING. 

Mr. King was Fellow of King's College, Cam- 
bridge. It is a fair token of his fitness to 
take part in this translation-work, that he suc- 
ceeded Mr. Spaulding, another of these Trans- 
lators, as Regius Professor of Hebrew in that 
University. Men were not appointed in those 
days to such duties of instruction, with the ex- 
pectation that they would qualify themselves 
after their induction into office.* 



RICHARD THOMPSON, 

Mr. Thompson, at the time of his appointment, 
was Fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge. Accord- 
ing to Wood he was "a Dutchman, born of Eng- 
lish parents." By the Presbyterian divines, he 
w r as called " the grand propagator of Arminian- 
ism." Of the prelatic Arminians Coleridge too 
truly said, that " they emptied revelation of all 

* The late Professor Stuart was wont jocularly to say, that, 
when he was appointed Hebrew professor at Andover, all he 
knew of the language was, that asfVrai meant blessed, and 
ha-ish meant the man I Psalm 1 : 1. 



100 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



the doctrines that can properly be said to have 
been revealed" If " sin be the greatest heresy," 
as that class usually affirms, a more serious error 
imputed to Mr. Thompson is intemperance in his 
later years. As to his literary qualifications, he 
is described by the learned Richard Montague as 
" a most admirable philologer," who was " better 
known in Italy, France, and Germany, than at 
home." 



WILLIAM BEDWELL. 

Mr. Bedwell was educated at St. John's College, 
Cambridge. He was Vicar of Tottenham High 
Cross, near London. He died at his vicarage, at 
the age of seventy, May 5th, 1632, justly reputed 
to have been " an eminent oriental scholar. "* He 
published in quarto an edition of the epistles of 
St. John in Arabic, with a Latin version, printed 
at the press of Raphelengius, at Antwerp, in 
1612. He also left many Arabic manuscripts to 
the University of Cambridge, with numerous 



*He is spoken of in his epitaph, as being "for the Eastern 
tongues, as learned a man as most lived in these modern times. 



WILLIAM BEDWELL. 



101 



notes upon them, and a font of types for printing 
them. His fame for Arabic learning was so great, 
that when Erpenius, a most renowned Orient- 
alist, resided in England, in 1606, he was much 
indebted to Bedwell for direction in his studies. 
To Bedwell, rather than to Erpenius, who com- 
monly enjoys it, belongs the honor of being the 
first who considerably promoted and revived the 
study of the Arabic language and literature in 
Europe. He was also tutor to another Oriental- 
ist of renown, Dr. Pococke. For many years, 
Mr. Bedwell was engaged in preparing an Arabic 
Lexicon in three volumes ; and w T ent to Holland 
to examine the collections of Joseph Scaliger. 
But proceeding very slowly, from desire to make 
his w r ork perfect as possible, Golius forestalled 
him, by the publication of a similar w r ork. 

After Bedwell's death, the voluminous manu- 
scripts of his lexicon were loaned by the Univer- 
sity of Cambridge to aid in the compilation of 
Dr. CasteLTs colossal work, the Lexicon Heptag- 
lotton. Some modern scholars have fancied, that 
we have an advantage in our times over the 
translators of King James's day, by reason of the 
greater attention which is supposed to be paid at 
present to what are called the " cognate" and 
" Shemitic" languages, and especially the Arabic, 



102 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



by which much light is thought to be reflected 
upon Hebrew words and phrases. It is evident, 
however, that Mr. Bedwell and others, among his 
fellow-laborers, were thoroughly conversant in 
this part of the broad field of sacred criticism. 

Mr. Bedwell also commenced a Persian dic- 
tionary, which is among Archbishop Laud's man- 
uscripts, still preserved in the Bodleian Library 
at Oxford. In 1615, he published his book, "A 
Discovery of the Impostures of Mahomet and of 
the Koran." To this was annexed his "Arabian 
Trudgeman." Trudgeman or truckman is the 
word Dragoman in its older form, and is derived 
from a Chaldee word meaning interpreter. This 
Arabian Trudgeman is a most curious illustration 
of oriental etymology and history. 

Dr. Bedwell had a fondness for mathematical 
studies. He invented a ruler for geometrical pur- 
poses, like what we call Gunter's Scale, which 
went by the name of " Bedwell's Ruler/' 

This closes what we have to say of that first 
Westminster Company, of ten members, to 
whom was committed the historical books, be- 
ginning with Genesis and ending with the Sec- 
ond Book of Kings, once " commonly called," 
as its title still says, " The Fourth Book of the 
Kings." 



EDWARD LIVELY. 



103 



The second company of King James's trans- 
lators held its meetings in Cambridge. To this 
section of those learned divines, was assigned 
from the beginning of Chronicles to the end of 
" The Song of Songs, which is Solomon's." The 
eight men to whom this important part of the 
work was assigned, were no whit behind their 
associates, in fitness for their great undertaking. 



EDWARD LIVELY. 

He is commemorated as " one of the best lin- 
guists in the world." He was a student, and 
afterw T ards a fellow, of Trinity College, Cam- 
bridge, and King's Professor of Hebrew. He 
was actively employed in the preliminary ar- 
rangements for the Translation, and appears to 
have stood high in the confidence of the King. 
Much dependence was placed on his surpassing 
skill in the oriental tongues. But his death, 
which took place in May, 1605, disappointed all 
such expectations ; and is said to have consider- 
ably retarded the commencement of the work. 
Some say that his death was hastened by his too 
close attention to the necessary preliminaries. 



104 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



His stipend had been but small, and after many 
troubles, and the loss of his wife, the mother of a 
numerous family, he was well provided for by Dr. 
Barlow, that he might be enabled to devote him- 
self to the business of the great Translation, 
He died of a quinsy, after four days' illness, leav- 
ing eleven orphans, " destitute of necessaries for 
their maintenance, but only such as God, and 
good friends, should provide." He was author 
of a Latin exposition of five of the minor Pro- 
phets, and of a work on chronology. Dr. Pusey> 
of Oxford, says, that Lively, " whom Pococke 
never mentions but with great respect, was prob- 
ably, next to Pococke, the greatest of our He- 
braists." 



JOHN RICHAHDSON. 

This profound divine was born at Linton, in 
Cambridgeshire. He was first Fellow of Eman- 
uel College, then Master of Peterhouse from 
1608 to 1615 ; and next Master of Trinity Col- 
lege. He was also King's Professor of Divinity. 
He was chosen Vice-Chancellor of the University 
in 1617, and again in 1618. He died in 1625, 



JOHN RICHARDSON. 



105 



and was buried in Trinity College Chapel. He 
left a bequest of one hundred pounds to Peter- 
house. 

He was noted as a " most excellent linguist," 
as every good theologian must be ; for, as Cole- 
ridge says, " language is the armory of the hu- 
man mind ; and at once contains the trophies of 
its past, and the weapons of its future conquests." 

In those days, it was the custom, at seats of 
learning, for the ablest men to hold public dis- 
putes, in the Latin tongue, with a view^ to display 
their skill in the weapons of logic, and " the dia- 
lectic fence." As the ancient knights delighted 
to display and exercise their skill and strength in 
running at tilt, and amicably breaking spears 
with one another ; so the great scholars used to 
cope with each other in the arena of public argu- 
ment, and strive for literary " masteries." Those 
scholastic tournaments were sure to be got up 
whenever the halls of science were visited by the 
king, or some chief magnate of the land ; and the 
logical conflicts, always conducted in the Latin 
tongue, were attended with as much absorbing in- 
terest as were the shows of gladiators among the 
Romans. 

On such an occasion, when James the First 
was visiting Cambridge, " an extraordinary act 
5* 



106 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



in divinity was kept for His Majesty's entertain- 
ment. Dr. John Davenant, a famous man, and 
afterwards Bishop of Salisbury, was " respond- 
ent." His business was to meet all comers, who 
might choose to assail the point he was to de- 
fend, — namely, that kings might never be excom- 
municated. Well did Dr. Davenant urge the 
wordy war, till our Dr. Richardson pushed him 
tremendously with the example of Ambrose, the 
famous Bishop of Milan, who, to the admiration 
of the whole Christian world, excommunicated 
the emperor Theodosius the Great. Here was a 
poser ! King James, who was always very ner- 
vous on the subject of regal prerogative, saw that 
his champion was staggering under that stunning 
fact ; and, to save him, cried out in a passion,— 
" Verily, this was a great piece of insolence on 
the part of Ambrose !"* To this, Dr. Richardson 
calmly rejoined, — " A truly royal response, and 
worthy of Alexander ! This is cutting our knotty 
arguments, instead of untying them."t And so 
taking his seat, he desisted from further discus- 
sion. The mild dignity of this remonstrance, in 



* Profecto fuit hoc ab Ambrosio insolentissime factum. 

f Responsum vere regium, et Alexandre* dignum ; hoc est non 
argumeiita dissolvere, sed desecare. 



LAWRENCE CHADERTON. 



107 



which independence and submission are happily- 
combined, presents him in such a light as to con- 
strain us to regret that this detached incident is 
about all we know of the personal character of 
the man. We can readily believe that he was a 
wise and faithful, as well as learned, Translator 
of the Book of God. 



LAWRENCE CHADERTON. 

This divine was a staunch Puritan, brave and 
godly, learned and laborious, full of moderation 
and the old English hardihood. He was born at 
Chaderton in Lancashire, in the year 1537. His 
family was wealthy, but bigotted in popery, in 
which religion he was carefully bred. Being 
destined to the bar, he was sent to the Inns of 
Court, at London, where he spent some years in 
the study and practice of the law. Here he be 
came a pious protestant ; and, forsaking the law, 
entered, as student, at Christ's College, Cam- 
bridge. Oh that, in a far higher sense, all divin- 
itv-students might be trained in Christ's own 
college, and learn their science from the Great 
Teacher himself ! 



108 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

These changes took place in 1564. Mr. Cha- 
derton applied to his father for some pecuniary 
aid ; but the wrathful old papist " sent him a 
poke, with a groat in it, to go a-begging ;" and 
disinherited his son of a large estate. The son 
had no occasion to use the begging-poke. His 
high character and scholarship procured him 
much favor ; while his mind was sustained by the 
promises of the Saviour, for whose sake he had 
" endured the loss of all things." He took his 
first degree in 1567, and was then chosen one of 
the Fellows of his College. He became Master 
of Arts in 1571 ; and Bachelor of Divinity in 
1584. He did not receive the degree of Doctor 
in Divinity til] 1613, when it was pressed upon 
him, at the time when Frederick, Prince Pala- 
tine of the Rhine, who married King James's 
daughter Elizabeth, visited Cambridge in state. 
Fuller, remarking upon this matter, writes, — 
" What is said of Mount Caucasus, ' that it was 
never seen without snow on the top,' was true of 
this reverend father, whom none of our father's 
generation knew in the University before he was 
gray-headed." 

"He made himself familiar with the Latin, 
Greek, and Hebrew tongues, and was thoroughly 
skilled in them. Moreover he had diligently in- 



LAWRENCE CHADERTON. 109 

vestigated the numerous writings of the Rabbis, 
so far as they seemed to promise any aid to the 
understanding of the Scriptures. This is evident 
from the annotations in his handwriting appended 
to the Biblia Bombergi,* which are still pre- 
served in the library of Emanuel College. "t His 
studies were such as eminently to qualify him to 
bear an important part in the translating of the 
Bible. In 1576, he held a public dispute with 
Dr. Baron, Margaret Professor of Divinity, upon 
the Arminian sentiments of the latter. In this 
debate, Dr. Chaderton appeared to the highest 
advantage, as to his learning, ability and temper. 

For sixteen years he was lecturer at St. Cle- 
ment's Church, in Cambridge, where his preach- 
ing was greatly blessed. In 1578, he delivered 
a sermon at Paul's Cross, London, which appears 
to have been his only printed production. About 
that time, by order of Parliament, he w r as ap- 
pointed preacher of the Middle Temple, with a 
liberal salary. It was thought best, perhaps, 
that a flock of lawyers should have the gospel 



* An edition of the Hebrew Bible, printed by Bomberg, at 
Venice, in 1518. 

f Yita Lanrentii Chadertoni, a W. Dillingham, S. T. P. 
Cantab. 1700. Pp. 15, 24. 



110 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



preached to them by one who had been bred to 
know the sins of their calling. 

In the year 1584, Sir Walter Mildmay, one of 
Queen Elizabeth's noted statesmen, founded 
Emanuel College, at Cambridge. Sir Walter 
was not supposed to be a very high Churchman, 
and the Queen charged him with having " erected 
a Puritan foundation/' In reply, he told her, that 
he had set an acorn, which, when it became an 
oak, God only knows what will become of it." 
And truly, it .pleased God, that it should yield 
plenteous crops of Puritan "hearts of oak;" and 
afford an abundant supply of that sound, substan- 
tial, and yet spiritual piety, which stands in 
strong contrast with all superstition and formal- 
ity. Emanuel College chapel, by order of the 
founder, was built in the uncanonical direction of 
north and south. Nearly a hundred years after, 
this non-conforming building was punished by 
the crabbed prelates, who had it pulled down, 
and rebuilt in the holy position of east and west, 
agreeably to the solemn doctrine of the "orienta- 
tion of churches !" Perhaps there was no better 
way to convert it from the Puritanism wherewith 
it was infected, than thus to give it first an over- 
turn, and then a half turn toward popery. 

It is likely, however, that the religious pecu- 



LAWRENCE CHADERTON. 



Ill 



liarities which long marked this College are to 
be ascribed less to the position in which the 
chapel was placed, than to the influence of its 
first Master. For this important office, Sir 
Walter Mildmay made choice of Dr. Chaderton. 
The modesty of the latter made him quite reso- 
lute to refuse the station, till Sir Walter plainly 
told him, — " If you will not be the Master, I will 
not be the Founder" Upon this, Dr. Chaderton 
accepted the office ; and filled it with zeal, and 
industry, and high repute, for thirty-eight years. 
Through his exertions, the endowments of the 
institution w T ere greatly increased, and it became 
a nursing mother to many eminent and useful 
men. 

At the Hampton Court Conference, in 1603, 
Dr. Chaderton w r as one of the four divines ap- 
pointed by the King as being "the most grave, 
learned, and modest of the aggrieved sort," to 
represent the Puritan interest. Dr. Chaderton, 
however, took no part in the debates, perceiv- 
ing that the Conference was merely a royal farce, 
got up to give the tyrant an opportunity to avow 
his bitter hostility to Puritanism, because of its 
incompatibility with abject submission to abitrary 
power. Coleridge, who was a staunch adherent 
of the Church of England, but by no means 



112 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



blinded on that account to the truth of history, 
thus expresses his opinion as to the Hampton 
Court affair. " If any man, who, like myself, 
hath attentively read the Church history of the 
reign of Elizabeth, and the Conference before, and 
with, her pedant successor, can shew me any 
essential difference between Whitgift and Ban- 
croft, during their rule, and Bonner and Gardin- 
er in the reign of Mary, I will be thankful to him 
in my heart, and for him in my prayers. One 
difference I see,— namely, that the former, pro- 
fessing the New Testament to be their rule and 
guide, and making the fallibility of all churches 
and individuals an article of faith, w T ere more in- 
consistent, and therefore, less excusable than the 
popish persecutors."* 

It w r as during his mastership of Emanuel Col- 
lege, that Dr. Chaderton was engaged in the Bi- 
ble translation, in which good work he was well 
fitted and disposed to take his part. " He w r as a 
scholar, and a ripe and good one." Having 
reached his three score years and ten, his know- 
ledge was fully digested, and his experience ma- 
tured, while " his natural force was not abated," 



* Literary Remains, II. 388. 



LAWRENCE CHADERTON. 



113 



and his faculties burned with unabated fire. Even 
to the close of his long life, " his eye was not 
dim," and his sight required no artificial aid. 

Many years after, in 1622, having reached the 
great age of eighty-five, this Nestor among the 
divines resigned the office he had so long sus- 
tained. Not that he was even then disqualified 
for its duties by infirmity ; but because of the 
rapid spread of Arminianism, and the fear that, if 
the business were left till after his death, a di- 
vine of lax sentiments, who was then waiting his 
chance, would be thrust into the place by the in- 
terference of the Court. The business was so 
managed, that Dr. Preston, the very champion of 
the Puritans, was inducted as Dr. Chaderton's 
successor. The vivacious patriarch, however, 
lived to survive Dr. Preston ; and to see Dr. San- 
croft, and after him, Dr. Holdsworth, in the same 
station. This latter incumbent preached Dr. 
Chaderton's funeral sermon. Dr. Holdsworth 
used to tell him, that, as long as he lived, he 
should be Master in the house, though he him- 
self was forced to be Master of the house. The 
patriarch was always consulted as to the affairs 
of the College. 

The most protracted and useful life must come 
to its end. There have been various accounts of 



114 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



the time of Dr. Chaderton's death, and of the 
place of his interment. But all mistakes are 
corrected by his Latin epitaph, which has been 
found on a monumental stone, at the entrance of 
Emanuel College chapel, and has been translated 
as follows ; 

Here 
lies the body of 
Lawrence Chaderton, D. D., 
who was the first Master of this College. 
He died in the year 1640, 
in the one hundred and third 
year of his age. 

Perhaps such longevity was more common then 
than now. It is on record, that "ten men of 
Herefordshire, a nest of Nestors, once danced 
the Morish before King- James, their united ages 
exceeding a thousand years." Their contempo- 
rary, Dr. Chaderton, was more honored by the 
gravity of his gray hairs, than they by the levity 
of their giddy heels. 

He was greatly venerated. All his habits 
were such as inspired confidence in his piety. 
During the fifty-three years of his married life, 
he never suffered any of his servants to be de- 
tained from public worship by the preparation of 
food, or other household cares. He used to say, 



LAWRENCE CIIADERTON. 



115 



— " I desire as much to have my servants to 
know the Lord, as myself." These things are 
greatly to his honor ; though his regard to the 
Lord's Day may excite the scorn of some in 
these degenerate times. 

Dr. Chaderton is described by Archdeacon 
Echard, as "a grave, pious, and excellent preach- 
er." As an instance of his power in the pulpit, 
we will close this sketch with an incident which 
could hardly have taken place any where on 
earth for the last hundred years. It is stated on 
high authority, that while our aged saint w T as vis- 
iting some friends in his native county of Lanca- 
shire, he was invited to preach. Having ad- 
dressed his audience for two full hours by the 
glass, he paused and said, — "I will no longer 
trespass on your patience." And now comes the 
marvel ; for the whole congregation cried out 
with one consent, — " For God's sake, go on, go 
on !" He, accordingly, proceeded much longer, 
to their great satisfaction and delight. " When," 
says Coleridge, " after reading the biographies of 
[Izaak] Walton and his contemporaries, I reflect 
on the crowded congregations, who with intense 
interest came to their hour-and-two-hour-long 
sermons, I cannot but doubt the fact of any true 
progression, moral or intellectual, in the mind of 



116 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



the many. The tone, the matter, the anticipated 
sympathies in the sermons of an age, form the 
best moral criterion of the character of that age." 
Let us not be so unwise as to inquire concerning 
this, " What is the cause that the former days 
were better than these ?" For even now people 
like to hear such preaching as is preaching. But 
where shall we find men for the work like those 
who gave us our version of the Bible ? 



FRANCIS DILLINGHAM. 

He was a Fellow of Christ's College, Cam- 
bridge. After the translation was finished, he 
became parson of Dean, his native place, in 
Bedfordshire. He also obtained the rich be- 
nefice of Wilden, in the same County, where he 
died a single and wealthy man. " My father," 
says worthy old Thomas Fuller, 66 was present in 
the bachelor's school, when a Greek act was 
kept* between Francis Dillingham and William 
Alabaster, to their mutual commendation. A 
disputation so famous, that it served for an era or 



* That is, a debate carried on in the Greek tongue. 



ROGER ANDREWS. 



117 



epoch, for the scholars in that age, thence to 
date their seniority." From this, it would seem, 
that he was not without reason styled the " great 
Grecian." He was noted as an excellent linguist 
and a subtle disputant, and w T as author of various 
theological treatises. His brother and heir, 
Thomas Dillingham, also minister of Dean, was 
chosen one of the famous Assembly of Divines at 
Westminster; but on account of age, illness, 
and for other reasons, did not take his seat. 
Francis Dillingham was a diligent writer, both 
of practical and polemical divinity. He col- 
lected out of Cardinal Bellarmine's writings, all 
the concessions made by that acute author in 
favor of Protestantism. He published a Manual 
of the Christian faith, taken from the Fathers, 
and a variety of treatises on different points be- 
longing to the Romish controversy. 



ROGER ANDREWS. 

Dr. Andrews, w 7 ho had been Fellow in Pem- 
broke Hall, was Master of Jesus College, Cam- 
bridge. He also became Prebendary of Chi- 
chester and Southwell. He too was a famous 
linguist in his time, like his brother Lancelot, 



118 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



the Bishop of Winchester, whose life has been 
already sketched as President of the first com- 
pany of the Translators. 



THOMAS HARRISON. 

He had been student and Fellow of Trinity 
College, Cambridge ; and was now Vice-Master 
of that important seminary. Thomas Fuller re- 
cords the following instance of his meekness and 
charity. "I remember when the reverend Vice- 
Master of Trinity College in Cambridge was told 
that one of the scholars had abused him in an 
oration. ' Did he,' said he, 6 name me ? Did he 
name Thomas Harrison ?' And when it was re- 
turned that he named him not, — 'Then,' said he, 
'I do not believe that he meant me.'" We have 
a strong evidence of his reputation in the Uni- 
versity in another duty which was assigned him. 
" On account of his exquisite skill in the Hebrew 
and Greek idioms, he was one of the chief exam- 
iners in the University of those who sought to be 
public professors of these languages."* 



* Harrisomis Honoratus, etc. a C. Dalechampio. Cantab, 
1632. P. 7. 



ROBERT SPAULDING. 



119 



ROBERT SPAULDING. 

Dr. Spaulding was Fellow of St. John's Col- 
lege, Cambridge. He succeeded Edward Lively, 
of whom we have briefly spoken, as Regius Pro- 
fessor of Hebrew. 



ANDREW BING-. 

Dr. Bing was Fellow of Peterhouse, Cam- 
bridge. In course of time he succeeded Geoffry 
King, who was Dr. Spaulding's successor, in the 
Regius Professorship of Hebrew. Dr. Bing w T as 
Sub-dean of York in 1606, and was installed 
Archdeacon of Norwich in 1618. He died during 
the times of the Commonwealth. 

These brief notices suffice to shew that the 
members of this company deserved their places 
among the translators. The quiet and unevent- 
ful lives of these secluded students and deep 
divines have left no strongly marked incidents 
on the historic page. But their learning still 
lives and instructs on the pages of their immortal 
work. 



120 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



The third company of the Translators, com- 
posed of Oxford divines, met at that famous seat 
of learning, and was fully equal to any other of 
these companies in qualifications for their im- 
portant undertaking. The part assigned to this 
division was from the beginning of Isaiah to the 
end of the Old Testament. 

JOHN HARDING. 

This divine was president in his company ; a 
station which shews how 7 high he ranked among 
his brethren who knew 7 him; though but little 
relating to his character and history has come 
down to our times. The offices filled by him 
w r ere such as to confirm the opinion that his 
learning and piety entitled him to the position he 
occupied in this venerable society of scholars. 
At the time of his appointment to aid in the 
translation of the Bible, he had been Royal 
Professor of Hebrew in the University fer 
thirteen years. His occupancy of that chair, at 
a time when the study of sacred literature was 
pursued by thousands with a zeal amounting to 
a passion, is a fair intimation that Dr. Harding 
was the man for the post he occupied. When 
commissioned by the King to take part in this 



JOHN HARDING JOHN REYNOLDS. 121 



version of the Scriptures, Dr. Harding was also 
President of Magdalen College. He was at the 
same time rector of Halsey, in Oxfordshire. The 
share which he, with his brethren, performed, 
was, perhaps, the most difficult portion of the 
translation-work. The skill and beauty with 
which it is accomplished are a fair solution of the 
problem, " How, two languages being given, the 
nearest approximation may be made in the 
second, to the expression of ideas already con- 
veyed through the medium of the first ?" 



JOHN REYNOLDS 

This famous divine, though he died m the 
course of the good work, deserves especial men- 
tion, because it was by his means that the good 
work itself was undertaken. He was born in 
Penhoe, in Devonshire, in the year 1549. He 
entered the University at the age of thirteen, and 
spent all his days within its precincts. Though 
he at first entered Merton College in 1562, he 
was chiefly bred at Corpus Christi, which he 
entered the next year, and where he became a 
Fellow in 1566, at the early age of seventeen. 
6 



122 .THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

Six years later he was made Greek Lecturer in 
his college, which was proud of the early ripe- 
ness of his powers. 

About this time occurred one of the most sin- 
gular events in the history of religious contro- 
versy. John Reynolds was a zealous papist. 
His brother William, who was his fellow-student, 
w T as equally zealous for protestantism. Each, in 
fraternal anxiety for the salvation of a brother's 
soul, labored for the conversion of the other ; and 
each of them was successful ! As the result of 
long conference and disputation, William became 
an inveterate papist, and so lived and died. 
While John became a decided protestant of the 
Puritan stamp, and continued to his death to be 
a vigorous champion of the Reformation. From 
the time of his conversion, he was a most able 
and successful preacher of God's w T ord. Having 
very greatly distinguished himself in the year 
1578, as a debater in the theological discussions, 
or " divinity-acts" of the University, he was 
drawn into the popish controversy. Determined 
to explore the whole field, and make himself mas- 
ter of the subject, he devoted himself to the study 
of the Scriptures in the original tongues, and read 
all the Greek and Latin fathers, and all the an- 
cient records of the Church. Nor did this flood 



JOHN REYNOLDS. 



123 



of reading roll out of his mind as fast as it poured 
in. It is stated that " his memory was little less 
than miraculous. He could readily turn to any 
material passage, in every leaf, page, column and 
paragraph of the numerous and voluminous works 
he had read." He came to be styled " the very 
treasury of erudition ;" and was spoken of as " a 
living library, and a third university." 

About the year 1578, John Hart, a popish zea- 
lot, challenged all the learned men in the nation 
to a public debate. At the solicitation of one of 
Queen Elizabeth's privy counsellors, Mr. Rey- 
nolds encountered him. After several combats, 
the Romish champion owned himself driven from 
the field. An account of the conferences, sub- 
scribed by both parties, was published, and wide- 
ly circulated. This added greatly to the reputa- 
tion of Mr. Reynolds, who soon after took his de- 
grees in divinity, and was appointed by the Queen 
to be Royal Professor of Divinity in the Univer- 
sity. At that time, the celebrated Cardinal Bel- 
larmine, the Goliah of the Philistines at Rome, 
was professor of theology in the English Sem- 
inary at that city. As fast as he delivered his 
popish doctrine, it was taken down in writing, 
and regularly sent to Dr. Reynolds ; who, from 
time to time, publicly confuted it at Oxford. 



124 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



Thus Bellarmine's books were answered, even 
before they were printed. 

It is' said, that Reynolds' professorship was 
founded by the royal bounty for the express pur- 
pose of strengthening the Church of England 
against the Church of Rome, and of widening 
the breach between them ; and that Dr. Rey- 
nolds was first placed in the chair, on that ac- 
count, because of his strenuous opposition to the 
corruptions of Rome. " Oxford divines/' at that 
period, were of a very different stamp from their 
Pusevite successors in our day. But even at Ox- 
ford, there are faithful witnesses for the truth. 
Dr. Hampden, whose appointment to the bishop- 
ric of Hereford, a few years since, raised such a 
storm of opposition from the Romanizing prelates 
and clergy, was for many years a worthy suc- 
cessor of Dr. Reynolds, in that chair which was 
endowed so long ago for maintaining the Church 
of England against the usurpations of Rome. 

Yet even so long ago, and ever since, there 
were persons there whose sentiments resembled 
what is now called by the sublime title of Pusey- 
ism. The first reformers of the English Church 
held, as Archbishop Whately does now, that the 
primitive church-government was highly popular 
in its character. But they held that neither this, 



JOHN REYNOLDS. 



125 



nor any other form of discipline, was divinely 
ordained for perpetual observance. They con- 
sidered it to be the prerogative of the civil gov- 
ernment, in a Christian land, to regulate these 
matters, and to organize the Church, as it would 
the army, or the judiciary and police, with a view 
to the greatest efficiency according to the state 
of circumstances. They held that all good sub- 
jects were religiously bound to conform to the 
arrangements thus made. These views are what 
is commonly called Erastianism. The claim of a 
" divine right " was first advanced in England in 
behalf of Presbyterianism. It was very strenuous- 
ly asserted by the learned and long-suffering 
Cartwright. Some of the Episcopal divines soon 
took the hint, and set up the same claim in be- 
half of their order ; though, at first, it sounded 
strange even to their own brethren.* 



* " Dr. Peter Heylin, preaching at Westminster Abbey, before 
Bishop Williams, accnsed the n on- conformists of 'putting all in- 
to open tumult, rather than conform to the lawful government 
derived from Christ and his apostles.' At this, the Bishop, sit- 
ting in the great pew, knocked aloud with his staff upon the pul- 
pit, saying, — ' Xo more of that point ! no more of that point, 
Peter!' To whom Heylin answered, — 'I have a little more to 
say, my lord, and then I have done :' — and so finished his sub- 
ject."— Biog. Bp.it. IV. 2597. Ed. 1747, 



126 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



Dr. Bancroft, Archbishop Whitgift's chaplain, 
and his successor in the see of Canterbury, main- 
tained in a sermon, preached January 12th, 1588, 
that " bishops were a distinct order from priests; 
and that they had a superiority over them by di- 
vine right, and directly from God." This startling 
doctrine produced a great excitement. Sir Fran- 
cis Knollys, one of Queen Elizabeth's distin- 
guished statesmen, remonstrated warmly with 
Whitgift against it. In a letter to Sir Francis, 
who had requested his opinion, Dr. Reynolds ob- 
serves, — " All who have labored in reforming the 
Church, for five hundred years, have taught that 
all pastors, whether they are entitled bishops or 
priests, have equal authority and power by God's 
word ; as the Waldenses, next Marsilius Patavi- 
nus, then Wiclif and his scholars, afterwards 
Huss and the Hussites ; and Luther, Calvin, 
Brentius, Bullinger^, and Musculus. Among our- 
selves, we have bishops, the Queen's professors 
of divinity, and other learned men, as Bradford, 
Lambert, Jewell, Pilkington, Humphrey, Fulke, 
&c. But why do I speak of particular persons ? 
It is the opinion of the Reformed Churches of 
Helvetia, Savoy, France, Scotland, Germany, 
Hungary, Poland, the Low Countries, and our 
own. I hope Dr. Bancroft will not say, that all 



JOHN REYNOLDS. 



127 



these have approved that for sound doctrine, 
which was condemned by the general consent of 
the whole church as heresy, in the most flourish- 
ing time. I hope he will acknowledge that he 
was oversee?!, when he announced the superiority 
of bishops over the rest of the clergy to be God's 
own ordinance." 

Good Dr. Reynolds' charitable hopes, though 
backed by such an overwhelming array of author- 
ities, were doomed to be disappointed. Ban- 
croft's novel doctrine has been in fashion ever 
since. Still there are not wanting many who 
soundly hold, in the words of Reynolds, that 
"unto us Christians, no land is strange, no 
ground unholy ; every coast is Jewry, every town 
Jerusalem, every house Sion ; and every faithful 
company, yea, every faithful body, a temple to 
serve God in. The presence of Christ among 
two -or three, gathered together in his name, 
maketh any place a church, even as the presence 
of a king with his attendants maketh any place a 
court." 

Notwithstanding that Elizabeth was no lover 
of men puritanically inclined, she felt constrained 
to notice the eminent gifts and services of Dr. 
Reynolds. In 1598, she made him Dean of Lin- 
coln, and offered him a bishopric. The latter 



128 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

dignity he meekly refused, preferring his studious 
academical life to the wealth and honors of any 
such ecclesiastical station. It is supposed, how- 
ever, that conscientious scruples had much to do 
with his declining the prelatic office. 

He resigned his deanery in less than a year, 
and also the Mastership of Queen's College, 
which latter post he had for some time occupied 
He was then chosen President of Corpus Christ! 
College, in which office he was exceedingly ac- 
tive and useful till his death. This College had 
long been badly infested with papistry. The 
presidency being vacant in 1568, the Queen sent 
letters to the Fellows, calling upon them to make 
choice of Dr. William Cole, who had been one of 
the exiles in the time of Queen Mary. The 
Fellows, however, made choice of Robert Har- 
rison, formerly one of their number, but an 
open Romanist. The Queen pronounced this 
election void, and commanded them to elect 
Cole. On their refusal, Dr. Horn, Bishop of 
Winchester, the Visitor of the College, was sent 
to induct Cole ; which he did, but not till he 
had forced the College-gates. A commission, 
appointed by the Queen, expelled three of the 
most notorious papists. As might have been 
expected, there was but little harmony in that 



JOHN REYNOLDS. 



129 



society. In 1579, Dr. Reynolds was expelled 
from his College, together with his pupil, the 
renowned Richard Hooker, author of the " Ec- 
clesiastical Polity," and three others. On what 
ground this was done is not known. It was the 
act of Dr. John Barfoote, then Vice-President of 
the College, and Chaplain to the potent Earl 
of Warwick. In less than a month, the expelled 
members were fully restored by the agency 
of Secretary Walsingham. In 1586, this Sir 
Francis Walsingham offered a stipend for a lec- 
tureship on controversial divinity, for the purpose, 
as Heylin, that rabid Laudian, says, of making 
"the religion of the Church of Rome more 
odious." Dr. Reynolds accepted this lecture- 
ship, and for that purpose resigned his fellowship 
in the College ; "dissentions and factions there," 
as he says, " having made him weary of the 
place." He retired to Queen's College, and was 
Master there, till, as has been stated, he became 
President of Corpus Christi in 1598, on the 
resignation of Dr. Cole. Dr. Barfoote struggled 
hard to secure the post ; but by the firm pro- 
cedure of that "so noble and worthy knight Sir 
Francis Walsingham," Dr. Reynolds carried the 
day. 

King James appointed him, in 1603, to be one 
6* 



130 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



of the four divines who should represent the 
Puritan interest at the Hampton Court Con- 
ference. Here he was almost the only speaker 
on his side of the question ; and confronted the 
King and Primate, with eight bishops, and as 
many deans. The records of what took place 
are wholly from the pens of his adversaries, who 
are careful that he should not appear to any great 
advantage. It is manifest from their own ac- 
count, that, in this "mock conference/' as Rapin 
calls it, the Puritans were so overborne with 
kingly insolence and prelatic pride, that, finding 
it of no use to attempt any replies, they held 
their peace. In fact, the whole affair was merely 
got up to give the King, who had newly come to 
the throne of England, an opportunity to declare 
himself as to the line of ecclesiastical policy he 
meant to pursue. 

The only good that resulted from this op- 
pressive and insulting conference was our pre- 
sent admirable translation of the Bible. The 
King scornfully rejected nearly every other 
request of the Puritans;* but, at the entreaty of 



* Their requests were very reasonable, viz. : 1. "That the 
doctrine of the Church might be preserved pure, according to 
God's word. 2. That good pastors might be planted in all 



JOHN REYNOLDS. 



131 



Dr. Reynolds, consented that there should be 
a new and more accurate translation, prepared 
under the royal sanction. The next year Dr. 
Reynolds was put upon the list of Translators, 
on account of his well known skill in the Hebrew 
and Greek. He labored in the work with zeal, 
bringing all his vast acquisitions to aid in accom- 
plishing the task, though he did not live to see 
it completed. In the progress of it, he was 
seized with the consumption, yet he continued 
his assistance to the last, During his decline, 
the company to which he belonged met regularly 
every week in his chamber, to compare and per- 
fect what they had done in their private studies. 
Thus he ended his days like Venerable Bede ; 
and " was employed in translating the Word of 
Life, even till he himself was translated to life 
everlasting." His days were thought to be 
shortened by too intense application to study. 
But when urged by friends to desist, he would 
reply, — " Non propter vitam, vivendi perdere 
causas," — for the sake of life, he would not lose 



church.es, to preach the same. 3. That church government 
might be sincerely ministered, according to God's word. -i. 
That the Book of Common Prayer might be fitted to more in- 
crease of piety." 



132 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



the very end of living ! During his sickness, his 
time was wholly taken up in prayer, and in hear- 
ing and translating the Scriptures. 

The papists started a report, that their famous 
opposer had recanted his protestant sentiments. 
He was much grieved at hearing the rumor ; but 
being too feeble to speak, set his name to the 
following declaration, — " These are to testify to 
all the world, that I die in the possession of that 
faith which I have taught all my life, both in my 
preachings and in my writings, with an assured 
hope of my salvation, only by the merits of Christ 
my Saviour." The next day, May 21st, 1607, he 
expired in the sixty-eighth year of his age. He 
was buried in the chapel of his College, with 
great solemnity and academic pomp, and the gen- 
eral lamentation of good men. 

His industry and piety are largely attested by 
his numerous writings, which long continued in 
high esteem. Old Anthony Wood, though so 
cynical toward all Puritans, says of him, that he 
was " most prodigiously seen in all kinds of learn- 
ing ; most excellent in all tongues." "He was a 
prodigy in reading," adds Anthony, " famous in 
doctrine, and the very treasury of erudition ; and 
in a word, nothing can be spoken against him, 
only that he was the pillar of Puritanism, and 



JOHN REYNOLDS. 



133 



the grand favorer of non- conformity Dr. 
Crackenthorpe, his intimate acquaintance, though 
a zealous churchman, gives this account of him, 
— " He turned over all writers, profane, ecclesi- 
astical, and divine ; and all the councils, fathers, 
and histories of the Church. He was most ex- 
cellent in all tongues useful or ornamental to a 
divine. He had a sharp and ready wit, a grave 
and mature judgment, and was indefatigably in- 
dustrious. He was so well skilled in all arts and 
sciences, as if he had spent his whole life in each 
of them. And as to virtue, integrity, piety, and 
sanctity of life, he was so eminent and conspicu- 
ous, that to name Reynolds is to commend virtue 
itself." From other testimonies of a like charac- 
ter, let the following be given, from the celebra- 
ted Bishop Hall of Norwich, — " He alone w 7 as a 
well-furnished library, full of aJl faculties, all 
studies, and all learning. The memory and read- 
ing of that man were near to a miracle." 

Such w T as one of the worthies in that noble 
company of Translators. Nothing can tend more 
to inspire confidence in their version than the 
knowledge of their immense acquirements, almost 
incredible to the superficial scholars in this age 
of smatterers, sciolists, and pretenders. How 
much more to be coveted is the accumulation of 



134 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



knowledge, and the dispensing of its riches to 
numerous generations, than the amassing of mo 
ney, and the bequeathing of hoarded wealth. 
Who would not choose the Christian erudition of 
an Andrews or a Reynolds, rather than the mil- 
lions of Astor or Girard ? 



THOMAS HOLLAND. 

This good man was born at Ludlow, in Shrop- 
shire, in the year 1539. He was educated at 
Exeter College, Oxford; and graduated in 1570, 
w^ith great applause. Three years after, he was 
made chaplain and Fellow of Baliol College ; and 
as Anthony Wood says, was " another Apollos, 
mighty in the Scriptures," — also " a solid preach- 
er, a most noted disputant, and a most learned 
divine." He was made Doctor in Divinity in 
1584. The next year, w T hen Robert Dudley, the 
famous Earl of Leicester, w T as sent as governor 
of the Netherlands, then just emancipated from 
the Spanish yoke, Dr. Holland went with him in 
the capacity of chaplain. In 1589, he succeeded 
the celebrated Dr. Lawrence Humphrey as the 
King's Professor of Divinity, a duty for which 
he was eminently qualified, and in which he 



THOMAS HOLLAND. 



135 



trained up many distinguished scholars. He was 
elected Rector of Exeter College in 1592; an 
office he filled with great reputation for twenty 
years, being regarded as a universal scholar, and 
a prodigy of literature. His reputation extended 
to the continent, and he was held in high esteem 
in the universities of Europe. These were the 
leading events in his studious life. 

As to his character, he was a man of ardent 
piety, a thorough Calvinist in doctrine, and a de- 
cided non-conforming Puritan in matters of cere- 
mony and church-discipline. In the public Uni- 
versity debates, he staunchly maintained that 
" bishops are not a distinct order from presby- 
ters, nor at all superior to them by the Word of 
God." He stoutly resisted the popish innova- 
tions which Bancroft and Laud strove too suc- 
cessfully to introduce at Oxford. When the exe- 
crable Laud, afterwards the odious Archbishop 
of Canterbury, was going through his exercises 
as candidate for the degree of Bachelor in Divin- 
ity, in 1604, he contended " that there could be 
no true churches without diocesan episcopacy." 
For this, the young aspirant was sharply and pub- 
licly rebuked by Dr. Holland, who presided on 
the occasion ; and who severely reprehended that 
future Primate of all England, as " one who 



136 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



sought to sow discord among brethren, and be- 
tween the Church of England and the Reformed 
Churches abroad." 

As a preacher, Dr. Holland was earnest and 
solemn. His extemporary discourses were 
usually better that his more elaborate prepara- 
tions. As a student, it was said of him, that he 
was so " immersed in books," that this propensity 
swallowed up almost every other. In the trans- 
lation of our Bible he took a very prominent part. 
This was the crowning work of his life. He 
died March 16th, 1612, a few months after this 
most important version was completed and pub- 
lished. He attained to the age of seventy-three 
years. » 

The translation being finished, he spent most 
of his time in meditation and prayer. Sickness 
and the infirmities of age quickened into greater 
life his desires for heaven. In the hour of his 
departure he exclaimed, — " Come, Oh come, Lord 
Jesus, thou bright and morning star ! Come, 
Lord Jesus ; I desire to be dissolved and be w^ith 
thee." He was buried with great funeral solem- 
nities in the chancel of St. Mary's, Oxford. 

One of his intimate associates and fellow-trans- 
lators, Dr. Kilby, preached his funeral sermon. 
In this sermon it is said of him, — " that he 



THOMAS HOLLAND. 



137 



had a wonderful knowledge of all the learned 
languages, and of all arts and sciences, both 
human and divine. He was mighty in the Scrip- 
tures ; and so familiarly acquainted with the 
Fathers, as if he himself had been one of them; 
and so versed in the Schoolmen, as if he were 
the Seraphic Doctor. He w T as, therefore, most 
worthy of the divinity-chair, which he filled about 
twenty years, with distinguished approbation and 
applause. He was so celebrated for his preach- 
ing, reading, disputing, moderating, and all other 
excellent qualifications, that all who knew him 
commended him, and all who heard of him 
admired him." In illustration of his zeal for 
purity in faith and worship, and against all super- 
stition and idolatry, the same sermon informs us, 
that, whenever he took a journey, he first called 
together the Fellows of his College, for his part- 
ing charge, which always ended thus, — "I com- 
mend you to the love of God, and to the hatred 
of all popery and superstition ! " * He published 
several learned orations and one sermon. He 
left many manuscripts ready for the press ; but 
as they fell into hands unfriendly to the Puritan- 
ism they contained, they were never published. 



* Commendo vos dilectioni Dei, et odio papatus et siiperstitionis. 



138 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



RICHARD KILBY. 

Among" those grave and erudite divines to 
whom all the generations which have read the 
Bible in the English tongue are so greatly in- 
debted, a place is duly assigned to Dr. Richard 
Kilby. He was a native of Radcliff on the river 
Wreak, in Liecestershire. He went to Oxford ; 
and when he had been at the University three 
years, was chosen Fellow of Lincoln College, in 
1577. He took orders, and became a preacher 
of note in the University. In 1590, he was cho- 
sen Rector of his College, and made Prebendary 
of the cathedral church of Lincoln. He was con- 
sidered so accurate in Hebrew studies, that he 
was appointed the King's Professor in that branch 
of literature. Among the fruits of his studies, he 
left a commentary cn Exodus, chiefly drawn from 
the writings of the Rabbinical interpreters. He 
died in the year 1620, at the age of sixty. 

These are nearly all the vestiges remaining of 
him. There is one incident, however, related by 
" honest Izaak Walton," in his life of the cele- 
brated Bishop Sanderson. The incident, as de- 
scribed by the amiable angler, is such a fine his- 
torical picture of the times, and so apposite to the 



RICHARD KILBY. 



139 



purpose of this little volume, that it must be 
given in Walton's own words. 

" I must here stop my reader, and tell him 
that this Dr. Kilby was a man of so great learn- 
ing and wisdom, and so excellent a critic in the 
Hebrew tongue, that he was made professor of it 
in this University ; and was also so perfect a 
Grecian, that he was by King James appointed 
to be one of the translators of the Bible ; and that 
this Doctor and Mr. Sanderson had frequent dis- 
courses, and loved as father and son. The Doc- 
tor was to ride a journey into Derbyshire, and 
took Mr. Sanderson to bear him company ; and 
they, resting on a Sunday with the Doctor's 
friend, and going together to that parish church 
where they then were, found the young preacher 
to have no more discretion, than to waste a great 
part of the hour allotted for his sermon in excep- 
tions against the late translation of several words, 
(not expecting such a hearer as Dr. Kilby,) and 
shewed three reasons why a particular word 
should have been otherwise translated. W hen 
evening prayer was ended, the preacher was in- 
vited to the Doctor's friend's house, where, aftei 
some other conference, the Doctor told him, he 
might have preached more useful doctrine, and 
not have filled his auditors' ears with needless 



140 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



exceptions against the late translation; and for 
that word for which he offered to that poor con- 
gregation three reasons why it ought to have 
been translated as he said, he and others had 
considered all them, and found thirteen more 
considerable reasons why it' was translated as 
now printed ; and told him, £ If his friend,' (then 
attending him,) ' should prove guilty of such in- 
discretion, he should forfeit his favor.' To which 
Mr. Sanderson said, 6 He hoped he should not.' 
And the preacher was so ingenuous as to say, 
' He would not justify himself.' And so I return 
to Oxford." 

This digression of honest Izaac's pen may 
serve to illustrate the magisterial bearing of the 
" heads of colleges," and other great divines of 
those times; and also, w 7 hat has now become much 
rarer, the humility and submissiveness of the 
younger brethren. It also furnishes an incidental 
proof of the considerate and patient care with 
w T hich our venerable Translators studied the ver- 
bal accuracy of their w T ork. When we hear 
young licentiates, green from the seminary, dis- 
playing their smatterings of Hebrew and Greek 
by cavilling in their sermons at the common ver- 
sion, and pompously telling how it ought to have 
been rendered, we cannot but wish that the appa- 



MILES SMITH. 



141 



rition of Dr. Kilby's frowning ghost might haunt 
them. Doubtless the translation is susceptible of 
improvement in certain places ; but this is. not a 
task for every new-fledged graduate ; nor can it 
be very often attempted without shaking the con- 
fidence of the common people in our unsurpassed 
version, and without causing " the trumpet to give 
an uncertain sound." 



MILES SMITH. 

This person, who was largely occupied in the 
Bible translation, was born at Hereford. His fa- 
ther had made a good fortune as a fletcher, or 
maker of bows and arrows, which was once a 
prosperous trade in " merrie England.'' The son 
was entered at Corpus Christi College, in 1568; 
but afterwards removed to Brazen Nose College, 
where he took his degrees, and " proved at length 
an incomparable theologist." He was one of the 
chaplains of Christ's Church. His attainments 
were very great, both in classical and oriental 
learning. He became canon-residentiary of the 
cathedral church of Hereford. In 1594, he was 
created Doctor in Divinity. 



142 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



He had a four-fold share in the Translation. 
He not only served in the third company, but 
was ojie of the twelve selected to revise the work, 
after which it was referred to the final examina- 
tion of Dr. Smith and Bishop Bilson. Last of all, 
Dr. Smith was employed to write that most 
learned and eloquent preface, which is become so 
rare, and is so seldom seen by readers of the Bi- 
ble ; while the flattering- Dedication to the King, 
which is of no particular value, has been often 
reprinted in editions on both sides of the Atlan- 
tic. This noble Preface, addressed by "the 
Translators to the Reader," in the first edition, 
" stands as a comely gate to a glorious city." 
Let the reader who would judge for himself, whe- 
ther our Translators were masters of the science 
of sacred criticism, peruse it, and be satisfied. 

Dr. Smith never sought promotion, being, as 
he pleasantly said of himself, " covetous of no- 
thing but books."* But, for his great labor, be- 
stowed upon the best of books, the King, in the 
year 1612, appointed him Bishop of Gloucester. 
In this office he behaved with the utmost meek- 
ness and benevolence. He died, much lamented, 



* Nullius rei prseterquam librorum avidus. 



MILES SMITH. 



143 



in 1624, being seventy years of age, and was 
buried in his own cathedral. 

He went through the Greek and Latin fathers, 
making his annotations on them all. He was 
well acquainted with the Rabbinical glosses and 
comments. So expert was he in the Chaldee, 
Syriac, and Arabic, that they were almost as fa- 
miliar as his native tongue. " Hebrew he had at 
his fingers' ends." He was also much versed in 
history and general literature, and was fitly cha- 
racterized by a brother bishop as " a very walk- 
ing library." All his books were written in his 
own hand, and in most elegant penmanship. 

In the great Bible-translation, he began w^ith 
the first of the laborers, and put the last hand to 
the work. Yet he was never known to speak of 
it as owing more to him than to the rest of the 
Translators. We may sum up his excellent cha- 
racter in the words of one stiffly opposed to his 
views and principles, who says, — " He was a 
great scholar, yet a severe Calvinist, and hated 
the proceedings of Dr. Laud !" 



144 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



RICHARD BRETT. 

This reverend clergyman was of a respectable 
family, and was born at London, in 1567. He 
entered at Hart Hall, Oxford, where he took his 
first degree. He was then elected Fellow of 
Lincoln College, where, by unwearied industry, 
he became very eminent in the languages, divin- 
ity, and other branches of science. Having taken 
his degrees in arts, he became, in 1595, Rector 
of Quainton in Buckinghamshire, in which bene- 
fice he spent his days. He was made Doctor in 
Divinity in 1605. He was renowned in his time 
for vast attainments, as well as revered for his 
piety. "He was skilled and versed to a criti- 
cism" in the Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Chaldee, 
Arabic, and Ethiopic tongues. He published a 
number of erudite works, all in Latin. It is re- 
corded of him, that " he was a most vigilant 
pastor, a diligent preacher of God's word, a 
liberal benefactor to the poor, a faithful friend, 
and a good neighbor." This studious and exem- 
plary minister, having attained this exalted repu- 
tation, died in 1637, at the age of seventy, and 
lies buried in the chancel of Quainton Church, 
whore he had dispensed the word and ordinances 
for three and forty years. 



MR. FAIRCLOUGH. 



145 



MR, FAIRCLOUGH. 

The author has bestowed great labor in endea 
voring to identify this person. After exhausting 
all the means of information within his reach, he 
is led to the belief, that the last on the list of this 
company of Translators, who is designated simply 
as " Mr. Fairclough," is Daniel Fairclough, other- 
wise known as Dr. Daniel Featley ; which, strange 
to say, is a corrupt pronunciation of the name 
Fairclough. This is distinctly asserted by his 
nephew, Dr. John Featley, who wrote a life of his 
uncle, and printed it at the end of a book, enti- 
tled "Dr. Daniel Featley revived." The nephew 
states, that his uncle was ordained deacon and 
priest under the name Fairclough. The main 
ground for questioning the identity, is the age of 
Daniel Fairclough, who, when the Bible-trans- 
lators were nominated, was only some tw^enty-six 
years old, which is considerably less than the 
age of most of his associates. He w T as, however, 
an early ripe, and a distinguished scholar; and 
comparatively young as he was, it devolved on 
him to preach at the funeral of the great Dr. 
Reynolds, w T ho died during the progress of the 
w^ork. This funeral service was performed with 
much applause, at only four days' notice, 
7 



146 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



The birth-place of Daniel Fairclough. or 
Featlev, to call him by the name whereby he is 
chiefly known, was Charlton, in Oxfordshire, 
where he was born about the year 1578. He 
was admitted to Corpus Christi College in 1594; 
and was elected Fellow in 1602. He stood 
in such high estimation, that Sir Thomas Ed- 
wards, ambassador to France, took him to Paris 
as his chaplain, where he spent two or three 
years in the ambassador's house. Here he held 
many " tough disputes" with the doctors of the 
Sorbonne, and other papists. His opponents 
termed him i; the keen and cutting Featlev and 
found him a match in their boasted logic ; 

u For lie a rope of sand could twist, 
As tough as learned Sorbonnist.'' 

On returning to England, he repaired to his 
College, where he remained till 1613, when he 
became Rector of Northill, in Cornwall. Soon 
after, he was appointed chaplain to Dr. Abbot, 
Archbishop of Canterbury, also one of the Trans- 
lators, by whom he was made Rector of Lam- 
beth, in Surrey. In 1617. he held a famous de- 
bate with Dr. Prideaux. the King's Professor of 
Divinity at Oxford. About this time, the Arch- 
bishop gave him the rectory of Allhallows 



MR. FAIR C LOUGH. 



147 



Church, Bread Street, London. This he soon 
exchanged for the rectory of Acton, in Middlesex. 
He was also Provost of Chelsea College ; and, at 
one time, chaplain in ordinary to King Charles 
the First. 

Being puritanically inclined, Dr. Featley was 
appointed, in 1643, to be one of the Assembly of 
Divines at Westminster. As he was not one 
of the " root and branch" party, who were for 
wholly changing the order of government, he 
soon fell under the displeasure of the Long Par- 
liament. Some of his correspondence with Arch- 
bishop Usher, who was then with the King at 
Oxford, was intercepted. In this correspondence, 
he expressed his scruples about taking the " sol- 
emn league and covenant ;" and for this, was 
unjustly suspected of being a spy. He was cast 
into prison, and his rectories were taken from 
him. The next year, on account of his failing 
health, he was removed, agreeably to his petition, 
to Chelsea College. There, after a few months 
spent in holy exercises, he expired, April 17th, 
1645. " Though he was small of stature, yet he 
had a great soul, and had all learning compacted 
in him." He published some forty books and 
treatises, and left a great many manuscripts. 
His other labors have passed away; "but the 



148 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



word of the Lord," which, as it is believed, he 
aided in giving to unborn millions, " abideth for 
ever." 



The fourth company of these famous scholars 
was composed of Oxford divines ; and to them, 
as their portion of the work, were assigned the 
four Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, and the 
Revelation of St. John the Divine. 



THOMAS RAYIS. 

This person, the president of his company, was 
born of worthy parentage, at Maiden, in the 
County of Surrey. He was bred at Westminster 
School; and then entered, in 1575, as student 
of Christ's Church, one of the Oxford colleges. 
As it is a matter of some interest, shewing that 
he went through an extensive course of study, 
the dates of his various degrees will be given. 
In 1578, he graduated as Bachelor of Arts; in 
1581, he proceeded as Master of Arts; in 1589, 
he became Bachelor in Divinity ; and in 1595, 



THOMAS RAVIS. 



149 



he was made Doctor in Divinity. The succes- 
sive degrees of the greater part of the persons 
belonging to the list of Translators could be giv- 
en ; but are omitted for the sake of brevity. It 
is enough to record, that they nearly all attained 
to the highest literary honors of their respective 
universities. 

Dr. Ravis, in 1591, was appointed rector of 
the Church of All-hallows, Barking, in London. 
The next year, he became Canon of Westminster, 
and occupied the seventh stall in that church. 
Two years later, he was chosen Dean of Christ's 
Church College. He was also, in 1596 and the 
year following, elected Vice-Chancellor of the 
University. In 1598, he exchanged his benefice 
at All-hallows Church for the rectory of Islip. 
He also held the Wittenham Abbey Church, in 
Berkshire. All these preferments and profitable 
livings mark him as a rising man. His holding 
a plurality of churches for the sake of their reve- 
nues, in neither of which he could perform the 
duties of the pastoral office, was one of the cases 
that justified the complaint of Lord Chancellor 
Ellesmere, at the Conference in Hampton Court. 
His lordship complained of this practice, as occa- 
sioning many learned men at tlie universities to 
pine for w r ant of places, while others had more 



150 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



than they could fill. " I wish, therefore/* 7 said 
he, " that some may have single coats, or one 
living, before others have doublets, or plurali- 
ties." To this, the frugal Bancroft, then Bishop 
of London, who kept his own ribs thoroughly 
warmed with such investitures, made the thrifty 
reply, — " But a doublet is necessary in cold wea- 
ther !" This prelate, a fierce persecutor of the 
Puritans, was reputed to have manifested very 
little " saving grace," except in the way of penu- 
rious hoardings. The graceless wags of his day 
made this epitaph upon him ; 

"Here lies his Grace, in cold clay clad, 
Who died for want of what he had V* 

The pernicious custom of pluralities, whereby 
a man receives tithes for the care of souls of 
which he takes no care, fleecing the flock he 
neither watches nor feeds, is one of those abuses 
still continued in the Church of England, and 
calling for thorough reform. 

In 1604, soon after Dr. Ravis was commissioned 
as one of the Bible-translators, the Lords of the 
Council requested his acceptance of the bishopric 
of Gloucester, for which there were very many 
eager suitors. Three years later, he was trans- 
lated to the bishopric of London. Anthony Wood 



THOMAS RAVIS. 



151 



says, that he was first preferred to the see of 
Gloucester, which he reluctantly accepted, on 
account of his great learning, gravity, and pru- 
dence ; and that though his diocese "was pretty 
well stocked with those who could not bear the 
name of a bishop, yet, by his episcopal living 
among them, he obtained their love, and a good 
report from them.' 5 If he deserved this commen- 
dation while at Gloucester, he changed for the 
w r orse on his translation to London, where he not 
only succeeded the bitter Bancroft in his office, 
but also in his severe and exacting behavior. So 
true is the remark, that "bishops and books are 
seldom the better for being translated." No 
sooner had he taken his seat in London, than he 
stretched forth his hand to vex the non-conform- 
ing Puritans. Among others, he cited before him 
that holy and blessed man, Richard Rogers, for 
nearly fifty years the faithful minister of Wea- 
thersfield, than whom, it is said, "the Lord hon- 
ored none more in the conversion of souls." In 
the presence of this venerable man, who, for his 
close walking with God, was styled the Enoch of 
his day, Bishop Ravis protested, — " By the help 
of Jesus, I will not leave one preacher in my 
diocese, w T ho doth not subscribe and conform." 
The poor prelate was doomed to be disappointed ; 



152 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED 

as he died, before his task was well begun, on 
on the 14th of December, 1609. On account of 
his high offices, and his dying before the transla- 
tion was completed, it is not probable that he 
took so active a part in that business as some of 
his colleagues. Though too much carried away 

by a zeal for the forms of his Church, which was 
V 

neither according to knowledge nor charity, he 
lived and died in deserved respect, and hath a 
fair monument still standing in his cathedral of 
St. Paul's. 



GEORGE ABBOT. 

This distinguished ecclesiastic was a native of 
Guildford, in Surrey. He was the son of pious 
parents, who had been sufferers for the truth in 
the times of popish cruelty. He was born 
October 29th, 1562. At the age of fourteen, he 
was entered as a student of Baliol College, Ox- 
ford ; and in 1583, he was chosen to a fellowship. 
In 1585, he took orders, and became a popular 
preacher in the University. He w T as created 
Doctor of Divinity, in 1597 ; and a few months 
after, was elected Master of University College. 
At this time began his conflicts with William 



GEORGE ABBOT. 



153 



Laud, which lasted with great severity as long as 
Abbot lived. Dr. Abbot was a Calvinist and a 
moderate Churchman ; while Dr. Laud was an 
Arminian, and might have been a cardinal at 
Rome, if he had not preferred to be a pope 
at Canterbury. 

In 1598, Dr. Abbot published a Latin work, 
which was reprinted in Germany. The next year 
he was installed Dean of Winchester. In 1600, 
he was elected Vice-Chancellor of the Universi 
ty ; and was re-elected to the same honorable 
post in 1603 and 1605. It was about this time, 
that he was put into the royal commission for 
translating the Bible. 

Dr. Abbot went to Scotland, in 1608, as chap- 
lain to the Earl of Dunbar ; and while there, by 
his prudent and temperate measures, succeeded 
in establishing a moderate or qualified episcopacy 
in that kingdom. This was a matter which King 
James had so much at heart, that he ever after 
held Dr. Abbot in great favor, and rapidly hur- 
ried him into the highest ecclesiastical dignities 
and preferments. He was made Bishop of Litch- 
field and Coventry on the 3d of December, 1609; 
and then, in less than- two months, was translated 
to the see of London. In less than fifteen months 
more, he was made Archbishop of Canterbury, 



154 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



and Primate of all England. Thus he was twice 
translated himself, before he saw the Bible trans- 
lated once. Though an excellent preacher, he 
had never exercised himself in the pastoral office, 
rising at one stride from being a University-lec- 
turer to the chief dignities of the Church. 

When he reached the primacy, he was forty- 
nine years of age ; and was held in the highest 
esteem both by the prince and the people. In all 
great transactions, whether in church or state, he 
bore a principal part. And yet, at times, he 
showed, in matters which touch the conscience, a 
degree of independence of the royal will, such as 
must have been very distasteful to the domineer- 
ing temper of James, and very unusual in that 
age of passive obedience, and servile cringing to 
the dictates of royalty. Thus it was, when the 
King, under the pretence that the strict observ- 
ance of the Sabbath, as practiced by Protestants, 
was likely to prejudice the Romanists, and hinder 
their conversion, issued his infamous " Book of 
Sports." This was a Declaration intended to en- 
courage, at the close of public worship, various 
recreations, such as " promiscuous dancing, ar- 
chery, leaping, vaulting, May-games, Whitsun- 
ales 3 or morrice-dances, setting up of May-poles, 
or other sports therewith used." This abomina- 



GEORGE ABBOT. lOO 

ble edict was required to be read by all ministers 
in their parish-churches. Its promulgation great- 
ly troubled the more conscientious of the clergy, 
who expected to be brought into difficulty by 
their refusal to publish the shameful document. 
Archbishop Abbot warmly opposed its enforce- 
ment, and forbade it to be read in the church of 
Croydon, where he was at the time of its publica- 
tion. The opposition was too much, even for the 
ruthless king ; and he, at last, gave up his im- 
pious attempt to heathenize the Lord's Day. 

It was in 1619, that the Archbishop founded 
his celebrated hospital at Guildford, the place of 
his nativity, and nobly endowed it from his pri- 
vate property. In that same year, a sad mis- 
chance befel him. His health being much im- 
paired, he had recourse to hunting, by medical 
advice, as a means of restoring it. This sort of 
exercise has never been in very good repute 
among- ecclesiastics. Jerome recognizes some 
w r orthy fishermen who followed the sacred call- 
ing ; but says, that "we no where read in Scrip- 
ture of a holy hunter." While his Grace of Can- 
terbury was pursuing the chase in Bramshill 
Park, a seat of the Earl of Ashby de la Zouch, 
an arrow from his cross-bow, aimed at a deer, 
glanced from a tree, and killed a game-keeper, an 



156 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



imprudent man, who had been cautioned to keep 
out of the way. This casual homicide was the 
cause of great affliction to the prelate. During 
the rest of his life, he observed a monthly fast, on 
a Tuesday, the day of the mishap. He also set- 
tled a liberal annuity upon the poor game-keep- 
er's widow, which annuity was attended with the 
additional consolation, that it soon procured her 
a better husband than the man she had lost. For 
the Primate, however, who was ever a celibate, 
there was no such remedy of grief, and all the 
rest of his life was overcast with gloom. This 
business subjected him to many hard shots from 
them that liked him not. Once returning to 
Croydon, after a long absence, a great many wo- 
men, from curiosity, gathered about his coach. 
The Archbishop, who hated to be stared at, and 
was never fond of females, exclaimed somewhat 
churlishly, " What make these women here !" 
Upon this an old crone cried out, — " You had best 
to shoot an arrow at us !" It is said that this 
tongue-shot, which often goes deeper than gun- 
shot, went to his very heart. 

His enemies made a strong handle of this acci- 
dental homicide. It w T as insisted, that the canon- 
law allows no "man of blood " to be a builder 
of the spiritual temple ; and that the Primate 



GEORGE ABBOT. 



157 



who had retreated after the accident to his hos- 
pital at Guildford, was disenabled from his cleri- 
cal functions. The King appointed a commission 
to try the question, Whether the Archbishop was 
disqualified for his official duties by this involun- 
tary homicide ? After long debate, in which the 
divines on the continent took part, it was the 
general decision, that the fact did disqualify. 
Nevertheless, King James, in his usurped char- 
acter as supreme head of the English Church, an 
office w T hich rightly belongs only to the King of 
kings, issued, in 1621, a full pardon and dis- 
pensation to the humbled Primate. Still, several 
newly-appointed bishops, who had been awaiting 
consecration, and among them Dr. William Laud, 
then bishop elect of St. David's, refused to re- 
ceive it from his hands, and obtained the myste- 
rious virtues of " episcopal grace " from other 
administration. Others, however, as Dr. Dave- 
nant, bishop elect of Salisbury, and Dr. Hall, 
bishop elect of Norwich, were solemnly conse- 
crated by their dejected metropolitan. 

All this did not discourage Archbishop Abbot 
from making vigorous opposition, in the following 
year, to the proposed match between Charles, 
Prince of Wales, and the Infanta, or Princess 
Royal, of Spain. Though this foolish, unpopu 



158 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



lar, and unsuccessful scheme was a favorite piece 
of policy with the King, who was quite unused 
to be thwarted by his courtiers, Dr. Abbot con- 
tinued to enjoy his confidence till the King's 
death in 1625. 

When Charles the First succeeded to the 
throne, he was crowned and anointed by the 
Archbishop of Canterbury. Nevertheless, the 
latter soon found himself in deep eclipse. His 
inveterate foe, the resolute Dr. Laud, then Bishop 
of Bath and Wells, came between, and intercept- 
ed the sunshine of royal favor. The matter of 
the fortuitous homicide seems to have been re- 
vived against him, as ground for his sequestra- 
tion. Charles required him to live in retirement, 
which he did at Ford; and in 1627, appointed a 
commision of five prelates, to suspend him from 
the exercise of his archiepiscopal functions. 
These prelates were Dr. Mountaigne, Bishop of 
London ; Dr. Neile, Bishop of Durham ; Dr. 
Howson, Bishop of Oxford ; and Dr. Laud, Bish- 
op of Bath and Wells. When the instrument 
for the Archbishop's suspension was drawn up 
for their signature, the four senior bishops de- 
clined to set their hands thereto, and appeared to 
manifest much reluctance and regret. " Then 
give me the pen!" said Bishop Laud; and 



GEORGE ABBOT. 



159 



" though last in place, first subscribed his name." 
The others, after some demur, were induced to 
follow his example. From that time, it is said, 
the Archbishop was never known to laugh ; and 
became quite dead to the world. 

Next year, however, the fickle king saw fit to 
alter his course ; and, about Christmas time, re- 
stored Dr. Abbot to his liberty and jurisdiction. 
He was sent for to Court ; received, as he stepped 
out of his barge, by the Archbishop of York and 
the Earl of Dorset, and by them conducted into 
the royal presence. The king gave him his hand 
to kiss, and charged him not to fail of attendance 
at the Council-table twice a week. He satin the 
House of Peers, and continued in his spiritual 
functions without further interruption till his 
death some five years after, when he was suc- 
ceeded in his see by his implacable and ill-starred 
rival, William Laud. 

Dr. Abbot's brief sequestration had made him 
popular in the country, and his restoration was 
probably owing to a desire to conciliate his influ- 
ence in the parliament, with which the king was 
already in trouble. The Archbishop rather coun- 
tenanced the liberal party, and stiffly resisted the 
slavish tenet of Dr. JVIainwaring, which raised 
such an excitement. This divine had publicly 



160 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



maintained, as was supposed with the royal ap- 
probation, "that the King's royal will and com- 
mand, in imposing laws, taxes, and other aids, 
upon his people, without common consent in par- 
liament, did so far bind the consciences of the 
subjects of this kingdom, that they could not re- 
fuse the same without peril of eternal damna- 
tion." Here was the " divine right of kings " 
with a vengeance ! 

Dr. George Abbot continued in office during 
those troublous times which preceded the civil 
wars, till he died, at his palace of Croydon, on 
Sunday, August 4th, 1633, at the age of seven- 
ty-one, quite worn out with cares and infirmities. 

He was a very grave man, and of a very 
"fatherly presence," and unimpeachable in his 
morals. He was a firm Calvinist, and a thorough 
Church-of-England-man. He was somewhat in- 
dulgent to the more moderate Puritans ; but the 
more zealous of them accused him sharply of be- 
ing a persecutor, while the high-toned church- 
men vehemently charged him with disloyalty to 
their cause. It is also said, that as he had never 
exercised the pastoral care, but was " made a 
shepherd of shepherds, before he had been a 
shepherd of sheep," he was wanting in sympathy 
with the troubles and infirmities of ministers. 



GEORGE ABBOT. 



161 



He was severe in his proceedings against clerical 
delinquents ; but he protested that he did this to 
shield them from the greater severity of the lay 
judges, who would visit them with heavier pun- 
ishments, to the greater shame of themselves and 
their profession. He was, in truth, stern and 
melancholy. As compared with his brother, 
Robert Abbot, the Bishop of Salisbury, it was 
said, that " gravity did frown in George, and 
smile in Robert." The other brother of these 
bishops was Lord Mayor of London. 

The Archbishop was regarded as an excellent 
preacher and a great divine. Anthony Wood 
speaks of him as a " learned man, having his 
learning all of the old stamp," — that is to say, 
vast and ponderous. He published lectures on 
the book of Jonah, and numerous treatises, most- 
ly relating to the political and religious occurren- 
ces of the times. But to have borne an active 
part in the preparation of the most useful and 
important of all the translations of the Bible, is 
an honor far beyond the chief ecclesiastical dig 
nities and the highest literary fame. 



162 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



RICHARD EEDES. 

Dr. Eedes was a native of Bedfordshire, born 
at Sewell, about the year 1555. At an early age 
he was sent to Westminster school. He became 
a student of Christ's Church, in Oxford, in 1571. 
He subsequently took his two degrees in arts, 
and two more in divinity. In 1578, he be- 
came a preacher, and arose to considerable 
eminence. In 1584, he was made Prebenda- 
ry of Yarminster, in the cathedral church 
of Salisbury ; and two years later, became 
Canon of Christ's Church, and chaplain to 
Queen Elizabeth. In 1596, he was Dean of 
Worcester, which was the highest ecclesiastical 
preferment he attained. He was chaplain to 
James L, as he had been to the illustrious queen 
who preceded him ; and was much admired at 
court as an accomplished pulpit orator. In his 
younger days, he was given, like some other 
fashionable clergymen, to writing poetry and 
plays ; but, in riper years, he became, as the an- 
tiquarian of Oxford says, " a pious and grave 
divine, an ornament to his profession, and grace 
to the pulpit." He published several discourses 
at different times. Dr. Eedes died at Worcester, 
November 19th, 1604, soon after his appointment 
to be one of the Bible-translators, and before the 



GILES TOMSON. 163 

work was well begun, so that another was ap- 
pointed in his place. But let him not be deprived 
of his just commendation, as one who was count- 
ed worthy' of being joined with that ablest band 
of scholars and divines, which was ever united 
in a single literary undertaking. 



GILES TOMSON. 

This good man was a native of " famous Lon- 
don town." In 1571, he entered University Col- 
lege, Oxford ; and, in 15S0, was elected Fellow 
of All Souls' College. A few years later, he was 
out in a shower of appointments, " with his dish 
right side up.' 1 He was, at that lucky season, 
made divinity lecturer in Magdalen College ; 
chaplain to Queen Elizabeth, as was his friend, 
Dr. Richard Eedes ; Prebendary of Repington; 
Canon residentiary of Hereford ; and Rector of 
Pembridge in Herefordshire. He was a most 
eminent preacher. He became Doctor in Divin- 
ity in 1602; and was, in that year, appointed 
Dean of Windsor. In virtue of this latter office, 
he acted as Registrar of the most noble Order of 
the Garter. 

Dr. Tomson took a great deal of pains in his 



164 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



part of the translation of the Bible, which he did 
not long survive. He was consecrated Bishop of 
Gloucester, June 9th, 1611 ; and a year after, 
June 14th, 1612, he died, at the age of fifty-nine, 
" to the great grief of all who knew the piety and 
learning of the man." Man is like the flower, 
whose full bloom is the signal for decay to begin. 
It is singular that Bishop Tomson never visited 
Gloucester, after his election to that see. 



HENRY SAYILE. 

Some have doubted whether the " Mr. Savile," 
on the list of Translators, was the renowned 
scholar afterwards known as Sir Henry Savile 
But the matter is put beyond doubt by Anthony 
Wood and others. Savile was born at Bradley, 
in Yorkshire, November 30th, 1549, " of an- 
cient and worshipful extraction." He gradu- 
ated at Brazen Nose College, Oxford; but after- 
wards became a Fellow of Merton College. In 
1570, he read his ordinaries on the Almagest of 
Ptolemy, a collection of the geometrical and as- 
tronomical observations and problems of the an- 
cients. By this exercise he very early became 



HENRY SAVILE. 



165 



famous for his Greek and mathematical learning. 
In this latter science, he for some time read vol- 
untary lectures. 

In his twenty-ninth year, he travelled in 
France and elsewhere, to perfect himself in 
literature ; and returned highly accomplished in 
learning, languages, and knowledge of the world 
and men. He then became tutor in Greek and 
mathematics to Queen Elizabeth, whose father, 
Henry VIII., is said by Southey to have set the 
example of giving to daughters a learned ed- 
ucation. It is to her highest honor, that when 
she had been more than twenty years upon the 
throne, she still kept up her habits of study, as 
appears by this appointment of Mr. Savile 

In 1686, he was made Warden of Merton Col- 
lege, which office he filled with great credit for 
six and thirty years, and also to the great pros- 
perity of the institution. Ten years later, he 
added to this office, that of Provost of Eton Col- 
lege, which school rapidly increased in reputa- 
tion under him. " Thus," as Fuller says, " this 
skilful gardener had, at the same time, a nursery 
of young plants, and an orchard of grown trees, 
both flourishing under his careful inspection." 
He was no admirer of geniuses ; but preferred 
diligence to wit. " Give me," he used to say, 



166 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED 



" the plodding student. If I would look for wits, 
I would go to Newgate ; — there be the wits !" 
As might be expected, he was somewhat unpopu- 
lar with his scholars, on account of the severity 
with which he urged them to diligence. 

Soon after his nomination as one of the Trans- 
lators, having declined all offers of other promo- 
tion, whether civil or ecclesiastical, he was 
knighted by the King. About the same time, 
he buried his only son Henry, at the age of eight 
years. In consequence of this bereavement, he 
devoted most of his wealth to the promotion of 
learning. He translated the Histories of Corne- 
lius Tacitus, and published the same with notes. 
He also published, from the manuscripts, the 
writings of Bradwardin against Pelagius ; the 
Writers of English history subsequent to Bede ; 
Prelections on the Elements of Euclid ; and other 
learned works in English and Latin. 

He is chiefly known, however, by being the 
first to edit the complete works of John Chrysos- 
tom, the most famous of the Greek Fathers. He 
spent large sums in procuring from all parts of 
Europe, manuscripts, and copies of manuscripts. 
He not only made learned and critical notes on 
his favorite author, but procured those of Andrew 
Downes and John Bois, two of his fellow-laborers 



HENRY SAVILE. 



167 



on the Translation of the Bible. His edition of 
one thousand copies was published in 1613, and 
makes eight immense folios. All his expenses in 
this labor of love amounted to above eight thou- 
sand pounds, of which the paper alone cost a 
fourth part.* It was fifty years before all the 
copies were sold. The Benedictines in Paris, 
however, through their emissaries in England, 
succeeded in surreptitiously procuring the labors 
of the learned knight, sheet by sheet, as they 
came from the press. Thesfe they reprinted as 
they were received, adding a Latin translation, 
and some other considerable matter, and forming 
thirteen mighty folios. By this transaction, the 
friars may have gained the most glory, but sure- 
ly are not entitled to much honor. 

Sir Henry Savile also founded two professor- 
ships at Oxford, with liberal endowments ; one of 
geometry, and the other of astronomy. It is re- 
lated of him; that he once chanced to fall in with 
a Master Briggs, of the rival University of Cam- 
bridge. In a learned encounter, Briggs succeed- 
ed in demonstrating some point in opposition to 



* Making the usual allowance for the difference in the value 
of money then and now, he expended to the value of more than 
three hundred thousand dollars ! 



168 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



the previous opinion of Sir Henry. This pleased 
the worthy knight so well, that he appointed Mr. 
Briggs to one of his professorships. He made 
other valuable benefactions to Oxford, in land, 
money, and books. Many of his books are still 
in the Bodleian library there. 

Sir Henry Savile died at Eton College, where 
he was buried, February 19th, 1621, in his sev- 
enty-second year. He was styled, " that maga- 
zine of learning, whose memory shall be honora- 
ble among the learned and the righteous for 
ever." He left an only daughter, Elizabeth, who 
was married to Sir John Sedley, a wealthy baro- 
net of Kent. Sir Henry's wife was Margaret, 
daughter of George Dacres, of Cheshunt, Esq. 
It is said that Sir Henry was a singularly hand- 
some man, and that no lady could boast a finer 
complexion. 

He was so much of a book-worm, and so sedu- 
lous at his study, that his lady, who was not very 
deep m such matters, thought herself neglected. 
She once petulantly said to him, " Sir Henry, I 
would that I were a book, and then you would a 
little more respect me." A person standing by 
was so ungallant as to reply, " Madam, you ought 
to be an almanac, that he might change at the 
year's end." At this retort the lady was not a 



JOHN PERYN. 



169 



little offended. A little before the publication of 
Chrysostom, when Sir Henry lay sick, Lady Sa- 
vile said, that if Sir Harry died, she would burn 
Chrysostom for killing her husband. To this, 
Mr. Bois, who rendered Sir Henry much assist- 
ance in that laborious undertaking, meekly re- 
plied, that " so to do were great pity." To him, 
the lady said, " Why, who was Chrysostom ?" 
" One of the sweetest preachers since the apos- 
tles 5 times," answered the enthusiastic Bois. 
Whereupon the lady was much appeased, and 
said, " she would not burn him for all the world." 
From these precious samples, it may be inferred 
that your fine lady is much the same in all ages 
of the world, no matter whom she may marry. 

It is enough for our purpose, that Sir Henry 
Savile was one of the most profound, exact, and 
critical scholars of his age ; and meet and ripe to 
take a prominent part in the preparation of our 
incomparable version. 



JOHN PERYN. 

Dr. Peryn was of St. John's College, Oxford, 

where he was elected Fellow in 1575. He was 

the King's Professor of Greek in the University ; 
8 



170 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



and afterwards Canon of Christ's Church. He 
was created Doctor of Divinity in 1596. When 
placed in the commission to translate the Bible, 
he was Vicar of Watling in Sussex. His death 
took place May 9th, 1615. These scanty items 
may serve to show, that he was fit to take part, 
with his learned and reverend brethren, in pre- 
paring our English Bible for the press. 



RALPH RAVENS. 

This was the Vicar of Eyston Magna, who was 
made Doctor of Divinity in 1595. He died in 
1616. It is thought that he did not act, for some 
reason, under the King's commission ; and that 
Doctors Aglionby and Hutten were appointed in 
place of him, and of Eedes, who died before the 
work was begun. 



JOHN HARMAR. 
A native of Newbury, in Berkshire. He was 
educated in William de Wykeham's School at 
Winchester ; and also at St. Mary's College, 



JOHN HARMAR. 



171 



founded by the same munificent Wykeham at 
Oxford. " Manners make the man, quoth Wil- 
liam of Wykeham," is a motto frequently in- 
scribed on the buildings of his School and Col- 
lege. Mr. Harmar became a Fellow of his Col- 
lege in 1574. He was appointed the King's 
Professor of Greek in 1585, being, at the time, 
in holy orders. He was head-master of Win- 
chester School, for nine years, and Warden of his 
College for seventeen years. He became Doctor 
of Divinity in 1605. His death took place in 
1613. He was a considerable benefactor to the 
libraries both of the school and the college of 
Wykeham's foundation. For all his preferments 
he was indebted to the potent patronage of the 
Earl of Leicester. He accompanied that noble- 
man to Paris, where he held several debates with 
the popish Doctors of the Sorbonne. He stood 
high in the crowd of tall scholars, the literary 
giants of the time. He published several learned 
works ; among them, Latin translations of several 
of Chrysostom's writings, — also an excellent 
translation of Beza's French Sermons into Eng- 
lish, by which he shows himself to have been a 
Calvinist, the master of an excellent English 
style, and an adept in the difficult art of trans- 
lating. Wood says, that he was " a most noted 



172 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



Latinist, Grecian, and Divine ;" and that he was 
always accounted a most solid theologist, admi- 
rably w r ell read in the Fathers and Schoolmen, 
and in his younger years a subtle Aristotelian," 
Of him too it may be said, " having had a princi- 
pal hand in the Translation," that he was worthy 
to rank with those, w r ho gave the Scriptures in 
their existing English form, to untold millions, 
past, present, and to come. 



WILLIAM BARLOW. 

The fifth company of Translators was com- 
posed of seven divines, who held their meeting's 
at Westminster. Their special portion of the 
work was the whole of the Epistles of the New 
Testament. The president of this company was 
Dr. William Barlow, at the time of his appoint- 
ment, Dean of Chester. He belonged to an an- 
cient and respectable family, residing at Barlow, 
in Lancashire. He was bred a student of Trinity 
Hall, in the University of Cambridge. He grad- 
uated in 1534, became Master of Arts in 1587 
and was admitted to a fellowship in Trinity Hall 
in 1590. Seven years later, Archbishop Whitgift 
made him sinecure Rector of Orpington in Kent, 



4 



WILLIAM BARLOW. 



173 



He was one of the numerous ecclesiastics of that 
day, who were courtiers by profession, and stu- 
died with success the dark science of preferment. 
When Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, was be- 
headed for high treason in the year 1600, Dr. 
Barlow preached on the occasion, at St. Paul's 
Cross, in London. He was now a " rising man." 
In 1601, the prebendship of Chiswick was con- 
ferred upon him, and he held it till he was made 
Bishop of Lincoln. In the year 1603, he became 
at the same time, Prebendary of Westminster 
and Dean of Chester. This latter prebendship, 
he held in u commendam" to the day of his 
death. 

When, soon after the accession of James Stuart 
to the throne of England, the famous Conference 
was held at Hampton Court, that monarch sum- 
moned, as we have said, four Puritan divines, 
whom he arbitrarily constituted representatives 
of their brethren. To confront them, he sum- 
moned a large force of bishops and cathedral cler- 
gymen, of whom Dean Barlow was one, all led to 
the charge by the doughty king himself. At the 
different meetings of the Conference, the Puri- 
tans w r ere required to state what changes their 
party desired in the doctrine, discipline, and wor- 
ship, of the Church of England. As soon as they 



174 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

ventured to specify any thing, they were brow- 
beaten and hectored in the most abusive manner 
by the monarch and his minions. In his time, 
when comparing his reign with the preceding, it 
was common to distinguish him by the title 
Queen James ; and his illustrious predecessor, as 
King Elizabeth. When his learned preceptor, 
Buchanan, was asked how he came to make such 
a pedant of his royal pupil, the old disciplinarian 
was cruel enough to reply, that it was the best 
he could make of him! This prince, who fancied 
himself to be, what his flatterers swore he was, 
an incomparable adept in the sciences of theolo- 
gy and " kingcraft, " as he termed it, was quite in 
his element during the discussions at Hampton 
Court. He trampled with such fury on the claims 
of Puritanism, that his prelates, lordly and cring- 
ing by turns, were in raptures ; and went down 
on their knees, and blessed God extemporaneous- 
ly, for " such a king as had not been seen since 
Christ's day !" Surely they were thrown off 
their guard by their exultation, when they set 
such an impressive example of " praying without 
book." 

This matter is mentioned here the more fully, 
because the principal account we have of this 
Conference is given by the Dean of Chester. It 



WILLIAM BARLOW. 



175 



is not strange that the Puritans make but a sorry 
figure in his report of the transactions. Gagged 
by royal insolence, and choked by priestly abuse, 
it could hardly have been otherwise. Indeed, 
they w T ere only summoned, that, under pretence 
of considering their grievances, the King might 
have an opportunity to throw off his mask, and to 
show himself in his true character, as a deter- 
mined enemy to further reformation in his 
Church. Dr. Barlow's account is evidently 
drawn up in a very unfriendly disposition to- 
ward the Puritan complainants, and labors to 
make their statements of grievances appear as 
weak and w T itless as possible. Had the pencil 
been held by a Puritan hand, no doubt the sketch 
would have been altogether different. The tem- 
per of the King and of his sycophantic court- 
clergy may be inferred from the mirth, which, 
Dr. Barlow says, was excited by a definition of a 
Puritan, quoted from one Butler, a Cambridge 
man, — " A Puritan is a Protestant frayed out of 
his wits !" The plan of the King and his mitred 
counsellors was, the substitution of an English 
popery in the place of Romish popery. Their 
notions were w r ell expressed, some years after- 
ward, in a sermon at St. Mary's, Cambridge, — 



176 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

" As at the Olympic games, he was counted the 
conqueror who could drive his chariot-wheels 
nearest the mark, yet not so as to hinder his 
running, or to stick thereon ; so he who, in his 
sermons, can preach near popery, and yet not 
quite popery, there is your man !" 

As we have already related, almost the only 
request vouchsafed to the Puritans at this Con- 
ference was one which was well worth all the 
rest. The King granted Dr. Reynolds's motion 
for a new translation of the Bible, to be prepared 
by the ablest divines in his realm. Dr. Barlow 
was actively employed in the preliminary ar- 
rangements. He was also appointed to take 
part in the work itself; in which, being a tho- 
rough bred scholar, he did excellent service. 

In the course of the work, in 1605, being, at the 
time, Rector of one of the London parishes, St. 
Dunstan's in the East, Dr. Barlow was made 
Bishop of Rochester. He was promoted to the 
wealthier see of Lincoln in 1608, where he pre- 
sided with all dignity till his death. He died at 
a time when he had some hopes of getting the 
bishopric of London. His decease took place at 
his episcopal palace of Buckden, where he was 
buried in 1613. He published several books 



JOHN SPENCER. 177 

and pamphlets, which prove him not out of place 
when put among the learned men of that erudite 
generation of divines. 



JOHN SPENCER. 

This very learned man was a native of the coun- 
ty of Suffolk. He became a student of Corpus 
Christi College, Oxford, where he graduated in 
1577. He was elected Greek lecturer for that Col- 
lege, being then but nineteen years of age. His 
election was strenuously, but vainly, opposed by 
Dr. Reynolds, partly on account of his youth, 
and on the ground of some irregularity in his ap- 
pointment. Perhaps this opposition was also to 
be ascribed to the fact, that young Spencer early 
attached himself to that party in his College 
which dreaded Puritanism quite as much as 
Popery. In 1579, he was chosen Fellow of the 
same College. 

He was the fellow-student, and, like Saravia, 

and Savile, and Reynolds, the intimate friend of 

Richard Hooker, the author of that famous work, 

" The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity." This 

work, in the preparation of which Spencer was 
8* 



178 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



constantly consulted, and was even said to have 
" had a special hand" as in part its author, and 
which he edited after Hooker's death, — this work 
is to this day the " great gun" on the ramparts of 
the Episcopal sect. Its argument, however, is 
very easily disposed of. It is thus described by 
Dr. James Bennett ; — " The architecture of the 
fabric resembles Dagon's temple ; for it rests 
mainly upon two grand pillars, which, so long as 
they continue sound, will support all its weight. 
The first is, ' that the Church of Christ, like all 
other societies, has power to make laws for its 
well-being;' and the second, that ' where the 
sacred Scriptures are silent, human authority 
may interpose.' But if some Samson can be 
found to shake these pillars from their base, the 
whole edifice, with the lords of the Philistines in 
their seats, and the multitude with which it is 
crowded, will be involved in one common ruin. 
Grant Mr. Hooker these two principles, and his 
arguments cannot be confuted. But if a Puritan 
can show that the Church of Christ is different 
from ail civil societies, because Christ had 
framed a constitution for it, and that where the 
Scriptures are silent, and neither enjoin nor for- 
bid, no human association has a right to inter- 
pose its authority, but should leave the matter in- 



JOHN SPENCER. 



179 



different ; in such a case, Hooker's system would 
not be more stable than that of the Eastern phi- 
losopher, who rested the earth on the back of an 
elephant, who stood upon a huge tortoise, which 
stood upon nothing." 

After the death of Hooker in 1600, his papers 
were committed to Dr. Spencer, the associate 
and assistant of his studies, to superintend their 
publication. He attended carefully to this liter- 
ary executorship, till the translation of the Bible 
began to engross his attention, when he commit- 
ted the other duty, though still retaining a su- 
pervisory care, to a young and enthusiastic ad- 
mirer of Hooker. The publication was not com- 
pleted at the time of Dr. Spencer's death, and 
the papers of Hooker passed into other hands. 

When he became Master of Arts, in 1580, John 
Spencer entered into orders, and became a popu- 
lar preacher He was eventually one of King 
James's chaplains. His wife was a pupil of 
Hooker's, as well as her brothers, George and 
William Cranmer, who became diplomatic char- 
acters, and warm patrons of their celebrated 
teacher. Mrs. Spencer was a great-niece of 
Thomas Cranmer, that Archbishop of Canter- 
bury, whom Queen Mary burnt at the stake for 
his Protestantism. In 1589, Dr. Spencer was 



180 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



made Vicar of Alveley in Essex, which he re- 
signed, in 1592, for the vicarage of Broxborn. 
In 1599, he was Vicar of St. Sepulchre's, beyond 
Newgate, London. He was made President of 
Corpus Christi College, on the death of Dr. Rey- 
nolds, in 1607. Dr. Spencer was appointed to a 
prebendal stall in St. Paul's, London, in 1612. 
His death took place on the third day of April, 
1614, when he was fifty-five years of age. Of 
his eminent scholarship there can be no question 
He was a valuable helper in the great work of 
preparing our common English version. We 
have but one publication from his pen, a sermon 
preached at St. Paul's Cross, and printed after 
his decease, of which Keble, who is Professor of 
Poetry at Oxford, says, that it is " full of elo- 
quence, and striking thoughts." 



ROGER FENTON. 

This clergyman was a native of Lancashire. 
He was Fellow of Pembroke Hall, in Cambridge 
University. For many years, he was " the pain- 
ful, pious, learned, and beloved minister " of St. 
Stephen's, Walbrook, London, to which he was 
admitted in 1601. He was also presented by the 



ROGER FEXTON. 181 

Queen to the Rectory of St. Bennet's, Sherehog, 
which he resigned in 1606, for the vicarage of 
Chigwell, in Essex. He was also collated, in 
place of Bishop Andrews, to the Prebendship of 
Pancras in St. Paul's cathedral, where he was 
Penitentiary of St. Paul's. His prebendship of 
Pancras also made him, (so Newcourt says,) 
Rector of that church. He died January 16th, 
1616, aged fifty years. He was buried under the 
communion-table of St. Stephen's, where there 
is a monument erected to his memory by his pa- 
rishioners, with an inscription expressing their 
affection toward him as a pastor eminent for his 
piety and learning. 

His principal publication is described as a 
" solid treatise" against usury. His most inti- 
mate friend was Dr. Nicholas Felton, another 
London minister. The following singular inci- 
dent is related of them by good old Thomas Ful- 
ler ; — " Once my own father gave Dr. Fenton a 
visit, who excused himself from entertaining him 
any longer. ' Mr. Fuller,' said he, ' hear how 
the passing bell tolls, at this very instant, for 
my dear friend, Dr. Felton, now a-dying. I 
must to my study, it being mutually agreed up- 
on betwixt us, in our healths, that the survivor 



182 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



of us should preach the other's funeral sermon.' 
But see a strange change ! God, ' to whom be- 
long the issues of death,' with the patriarch Ja- 
cob blessing his grand-children, ' wittingly guid- 
ed his hands across,' reaching out death to the 
living, and life to the dying. So that Dr. Felton 
recovered, and not only performed that last office 
to his friend, Dr. Fenton, but survived him more 
than ten years, and died Bishop of Ely." By that 
funeral sermon, it appears that Dr. Fenton was 
free of the Grocers' Company, a wealthy guild, 
to whom belonged the patronage of St. Stephen's 
Church. He was also Preacher of Gray's Inn, a 
society or college of lawyers. Bishop Felton 
says of him, — " None was fitter to dive into the 
depths of school divinity. He was taken early 
from the University, and had many troubles after- 
ward ; yet he grew, and brought forth fruit. Nev- 
er a more learned hath Pembroke Hall brought 
forth, with but one exception." This nameless 
exception was doubtless the great Bishop Lance- 
lot Andrews. Dr. Fenton suffered severely in 
regard to health, in consequence of his sedentary 
habits. "In the time of his sickness," says his 
friend, "I told him, that his weakness and dis- 
ease were trials only of his faith and patience." 



RALPH HUTCHINSON WM. DAK1NS. 183 

Oh no, he answered, they are not trials but cor- 
rections * 



KALPH HUTCHINSON. 

Dr. Hutchinson, at the time of his appoint- 
ment, was President of St. John's College, hav- 
ing entered that office in 1590. This, which 
marks him as a learned man, is all we can tell 
of him. 



WILLIAM DAKINS. 

He was educated at Westminster School, and 
admitted to Trinity College, Cambridge, May 
8th, 1587. He was chosen Fellow in 1593. He 
became Bachelor in Divinity in 1601. The next 
year he w 7 as appointed Greek lecturer. In 1604, 
he was appointed Professor of Divinity at Gresh- 
am College, London. He was elected on the re- 
commendation of the Vice-Chancellor and Heads 



* Non probationes, sed castigationes. 



184 



THE 



TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



of Colleges in Cambridge, and also of several of 
the nobility, and of the King himself. The King 
in his letter to the Mayor and Aldermen of Lon- 
don, calls him " an ancient divine," not in allu- 
sion to his age, but his character. This appoint- 
ment was given him as a remuneration for his 
undertaking to do his part in the Bible-transla- 
tion. He was considered peculiarly fit to be em- 
ployed in this work, on account of "his skill in 
the original languages." In 1606, he was cho- 
sen Dean of Trinity College ; but died a few 
months after, on the second day of October, be- 
ing less than forty years of age. Though taken 
away in the midst of his days, and of the work 
on account of which we are interested in him, he 
evidently stood in high repute as to his qualifica- 
tions for a duty of such interest and importance. 



MICHAEL RABBET. 

All we can tell of him is, that he was a Bach- 
elor in Divinity, and Rector of the Church of St. 
Vedast, Foster Lane, London. 



MR. SANDERSON. 



135 



MR. SANDERSON. 

The bare name is all that is left to us with any 
certainty. Wood mentions a Thomas Sanderson, 
D. D., of Baliol College, Oxford, who was in- 
stalled Archdeacon of Rochester in 1606 ; but 
does not say whether he was one of our Transla- 
tors. 



The sixth and last company of King James's 
Bible-translators met at Cambridge. To this 
company was assigned all the Apocryphal books, 
w T hich, in those times, were more read and ac- 
counted of than now, though by no means placed 
on a level with the canonical books of Scrip- 
ture.* Still this party of the Translators had as 



* The reasons assigned for not admitting the apocryphal books 
into the canov, or list, of inspired Scriptures are briefly the fol- 
lowing. 1. Not one of them is in the Hebrew language, which 
was alone used by the inspired historians and poets of the Old 
Testament. 2. Not one of the writers lays any claim to in- 
spiration. 3. These books were never acknowledged as sacred 
Scriptures by the Jewish Church, and therefore were never 



186 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

much to do as either of the others, in the repeat- 
ed revision of the version of the canonical books , 

JOHN DUPORT. 

The president of this company was Dr. Duport, 
then Master of Jesus College, and Prebendary 
of Ely. He Was son of Thomas Duport, Esquire ; 
and was born at Shepshead, in Leicestershire. 
He was bred at Jesus College, Cambridge, w^here 
he became Fellow, and afterwards Master, which 
latter office he exercised with great reputation for 
nearly thirty years. He was a liberal benefactor 
of the College. In 1580 he was Proctor in the 
University ; and in the same year he was made 
Rector of Harlton in Cambridgeshire. He after- 
wards bestowed the perpetual advowsance of 
this rectory on his College. He was soon after 

sanctioned by our Lord. 4. They were not allowed a place 
among the sacred books, during the first four centuries of the 
Christian Church. 5. They contain fabulous statements, and 
statements which contradict not only the canonical Scriptures, 
but themselves ; as when, in the two Books of Maccabees, Anti- 
ochus Epiphanes is made to die three different deaths in as many 
different places. 6. It inculcates doctrines at variance with the 
Bible, such as prayers for the dead and sinless perfection. 7. It 
teaches immoral practices, such as lying, suicide, assassination and 
magical incantation. For these and other reasons, the Apocry- 
phal books, which are all in Greek, except one which is extant 
only in Latin, are valuable only as ancient documents, illustrative 
of the manners, language, opinions and history of the East. 



JOHN DUPORT. 187 

Rector of Bosworth and Medbourn, in his native 
County. In 1583, he was collated to the rectory 
of Fulham, in Middlesex, which was a sinecure. 
Such frequent change of parishes, in a clergy- 
man of the Anglican Church, is a sign of great 
prosperity ; as they are always changes from a 
poorer benefice to a better, and are considered as 
" preferments." 

Almost every parish, whenever vacant, is in the 
gift of some man of wealth, or high officer in 
church, state, university, or other corporation: 
Hence frequent removals to more desirable par- 
ishes tend to shew that a clergyman has very 
influential friends or is in high esteem. Still this 
does not necessarily follow, inasmuch as a very 
great part of this business is mere matter of bar- 
gain and sale. The person who has the right of 
presenting a clergyman to be pastor of a vacant 
church is called the " patron ;" and the right of 
presentation is called the " a'dvowson." These 
advowsons are bought, sold, bequeathed or inherit- 
ed, like any other right or possession. They may 
be owned by heretics or infidels, who are under 
very little restraint as to their choice of ministers 
to fill the vacancies that occur. If the bishop 
should refuse to institute the person nominated, it 
would involve the prelate in great trouble, un 



188 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



less he could make out a very strong case against 
the fitness of the rejected presentee. Meanwhile 
the flocks, who pay the tithes which support the 
minister, have no voice in the matter, except in 
comparatively few parishes. They may be dear- 
ly loved for their flesh and fleece ; but they must 
take the shepherd who is set over them. If they 
dislike his pasture, and jump the fences to feed 
elsewhere, they must pay tithes and offerings all 
the same to the convivial rector, fox-hunting 
vicar, or Puseyite priest, who has secured the 
" benefice " or " living." It is astonishing, that, 
under such an ecclesiastical system, the Church 
of England is not more thoroughly corrupted. 
And it is astonishing, that such a system can be 
endured to the middle of such a century as this, 
by a nation whose loudest and proudest boast is 
of liberty. 

While Dr. Duport was rapidly rising in the 
scale of preferment, he retained his connection 
with Jesus College. After he w^as made Master 
in 1590, he was four times elected Vice-Chan- 
cellor, the highest resident officer, of the Uni- 
versity. In 1585, he became Precentor of St. 
Paul's, London ; and in 1609, was made Preben- 
dary of Ely. He married Rachel, daughter to 
Richard Cox, Bishop of Ely. They were very 



WM. BRAIN THWA1TE JEREMIAH RADCL1FFE. 1S9 



happy in their son James Duport, D. D., a dis- 
tinguished Greek professor and divine. The 
father died about Christmas, in 1617, leaving a 
well-earned reputation as " a reverend man in his 
generation." Let him also be reverend in this 
generation, for his agency in the final prepara- 
tion of the Bible in English. 



WILLIAM BRAINTHTVAITE. 

Of Dr. Brainthwaite we recover but little. He 
spent his life in Cambridge University, where he 
was first a student of Clare Hall, then Fellow of 
Emanuel College, and at last Master of Gonvil 
and Caius College. He was in this last office, 
when he was named in the royal commission as 
one of the Translators. He was a benefactor of 
the last-mentioned colleges; and in 1619, was 
Vice-Chancellor of the University. These few 
items go to mark him as a learned, reverend, and 
worshipful divine. 



JEREMIAH RADCLHTE. 

Dr. Radcliffe was one of the Senior Fellows of 
Trinity College, Cambridge. In 1588, he was 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

Vicar of Evesham ; and two years later, he was 
Rector of Orwell. He was Vice-Master of his 
College in 1597. In the year 1600, he was made 
Doctor in Divinity, both at Cambridge and Ox- 
ford. Thus he, too, is to be ranked as a scho- 
lar and a divine by calling. His death took 
place in 1612. 



190 



SAMUEL WARD. 

This was a man of mark, — " a vast scholar." 
He was a native of Bishop's Middleham, in the 
county of Durham. His father was a gentleman 
of " more ancientry than estate." He studied 
at Cambridge, where he was at first a student of 
Christ's College, then a Fellow of Emanuel, and 
afterwards Master of Sidney Sussex College. He 
entered upon this latter office in 1609, and occu- 
pied it with great usefulness and honor till his 
death, thirty-four years after. His- college flour- 
ished greatly under his administration. Four 
new fellowships were founded, all the scholar- 
ships augmented, and a chapel and new range of 
buildings erected, all in his time. He was dis 
tinguished for the gravity of his deportment, 



SAMUEL WARD. 



191 



and for the integrity with which he discharged 
the duties of his Mastership. 

■ 

Being appointed chaplain to the royal favorite, 
Bishop Montague, he was by that prelate made 
Archdeacon of Taunton in 1615, and also Pre- 
bendary of Wells. The King next year presented 
him to the rectory of Much-Munden in Hertford- 
shire ; and also appointed him one of his chap- 
lains. In 1617, the excellent Dr. Toby Mathew, 
archbishop of York, made him Prebendary of 
Ampleford in the cathedral church of York ; 
and this stall Dr. Ward retained as long as he 
lived. 

King James sent him, in 1618, to the Synod of 
Dort, in Holland, together with Bishops Carle- 
ton, Davenant, and Hall ; as the four divines 
most able and meet to represent the Church of 
England, at that famous Council. After a while 
Dr. Goad, a powerful divine and chaplain to Dr. 
Abbot, Archbishop of Canterbury, was sent in the 
place of Dr. Hall, recalled at his own request, on 
account of sickness. The English delegates 
were treated with the highest consideration ; and 
having exerted a very happy influence in the 
Synod, returned with great honor to their own 
country, after six or eight months' absence. The 
sittings of the Synod began November 3d, 1618, 



192 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



and ended April 29th of the next year. During 
all this time, the States General of Holland al- 
lowed the British envoys ten pounds sterling each 
day ; and, at their departure, gave them two hun- 
dred pounds to bear their expenses ; and also to 
each of them a splendid gold medal, representing 
the Synod in session. 

At this celebrated ecclesiastical council, Wal- 
ter Balcanqual, B. D., Fellow of Pembroke Hall, 
and afterwards Master of the Savoy, by order of 
King James, represented the Presbyterian Church 
of Scotland. There were also, besides the mem- 
bers from the Dutch provinces, delegates present 
from Hesse, the Palatinate, Bremen, and Swit- 
zerland, all of whose churches practised the 
Presbyterial form of discipline and government. 
The Church of England, through its " supreme 
head," acknowledged and communed with all 
these as true churches of the Lord Jesus Christ, 
— sitting and acting with them, by its delegated 
theologians, in a solemn ecclesiastical assembly. 
Surely the spirit of the Anglican Church in those 
days was widely different from what is manifest- 
ed now. 

The object of the Synod, which was convened 
by order of their High Mightinesses, the Lords 
States General, was to settle the doctrinal dis- 



SAMUEL WARD. 



193 



putes which then convulsed the established 
Church of the Netherlands. For some ten years 
the dispute had been very sharp between the 
Calvinists, who adhered to the old national faith, 
and the followers of Arminius, who innovated up- 
on the old order of things. The points in dispute 
related to divine predestination, the nature and 
extent of the atonement, the corruption of man, 
his conversion to God, and the perseverance of 
saints. These five points are explained in some 
sixty " canons," which were " confirmed by the 
unanimous consent of all and each of the mem- 
bers of the whole Synod." The Dordrechtan 
Canons are, perhaps, the most careful and exact 
statement of the Calvinistic belief, in scientific 
form, that has ever been drawn up. It is wisely 
framed, so that all the usual objections to these 
doctrines are forestalled and excluded in the very 
form of their statement. Although the decrees 
of Dordrecht had not the desired effect of quell- 
ing the errors of Arminianism, they are worthy 
of all it cost to procure them. At the time of 
their adoption, King James was very hostile to 
the Arminians. He soon, however, became more 
lenient toward them, when convinced by Bishop 
Laud, that the laxity and pliancy of Arminianism 

made it far more supple and convenient for the 
9 



194 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



purposes of kingcraft " and civil despotism, 
than the stiff and unyielding temper of Calvin- 
ism, whose first principle is obedience to God 
rather than to man. The court favor took such 
a turn, that it was not many years till, in answ 7 er 
to a question as to what the Arminians held, it 
was wittily said, that they held almost all the 
best bishoprics and deaneries in England. 

Before going home to England, the British del- 
egates made a tour through the provinces of Hol- 
land, and were received with great respect in 
most of the principal cities. On his return, Dr. 
Ward resumed his duties as head of Sidney Col- 
lege. In 1621, he was Vice-Chancellor of the 
University. In the same year, he was made the 
Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity, which 
office he sustained with great celebrity for more 
than twenty years. The English Bible, which 
he actively assisted in translating, was formally 
published in 1611. Some errors of the press 
having crept into the first edition, and others into 
later reprints, King Charles the First, in 1638, 
had another edition printed at Cambridge, which 
was revised by Dr. Ward and Mr. Bois, two of 
the original Translators who still survived, as- 
sisted by Dr. Thomas Goad, Mr. Mede, and other 
learned men. 



SAMUEL WARD. 195 

When the Assembly of Divines was convened 
at Westminster, 1643, Dr. Ward was summoned 
as a member, but never attended. In doctrine, 
he was a thorough Puritan ; but in politics, a 
staunch royalist. In the sad and distracted times 
of the civil wars, as Thomas Fuller, his affec- 
tionate pupil, says, " he turned as a rock riseth 
with the tide. — In a word, he was accounted a 
Puritan before these times, and popish in these 
times; and yet, being always the same, was a 
true Protestant at all times." When hostilities 
broke out, he joined the other heads of Colleges 
at Cambridge, in sending their college-plate to 
aid the tyrannical Charles Stuart, whose charac- 
ter, partially redeemed by some private virtues, 
has been so admirably exposed by Macaulay. 
" Faithlessness," says that philosophic historian, 
" was the chief cause of his disasters, and is the 
chief stain on his memory. He was, in truth, 
impelled by an incurable propensity to dark and 
crooked w r ays. It may seem strange that his 
conscience, which, on occasions of little mo- 
ment, was sufficiently sensitive, should never 
have reproached him with this great vice. But 
there is reason to believe that he was perfidious, 
not only from constitution and from habit, but 
also on principle." This historical judgment may 



196 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



seem severe ; but its truth is maintained by other 
competent critics. James Stuart was undoubted- 
ly one of the worse sort of monarchs ; but of him 
Coleridge frankly says, — " James L, in my hon- 
est judgment, was an angel, compared with his 
sons and grandsons." 

Dr. Ward, no doubt, like many other good men 
who disliked the King's proceedings, was com- 
pelled, by his conscientious belief in the long es- 
tablished doctrine of the " divine right of kings," 
to uphold his sovereign. In consequence of his 
sending the college-plate to be coined .for the 
King's use, the parliamentary authorities de- 
prived Dr. Ward of his professorship and master- 
ship, and confiscated his goods. He was also, in 
1642, with three other heads of colleges involved 
in the same transaction, imprisoned in St. John's 
College for a short time. During his confine- 
ment, he contracted a disorder that proved fatal 
in six weeks after his liberation, w T hich was 
granted on account of his sickness. He died, in 
great want, at an advanced age, in 1643, and 
was the first person buried in Sidney Sussex 
Chapel. A beautiful character is drawn in some 
Latin verses addressed to him by Dr. Thomas 
Goad, the close of which is thus given in English 
by Fuller ;— 



SAMUEL WARD. 



197 



" None thy quick sight, grave judgment, can beguile, 
So skilled in tongues, so sinewy in style ; 
Add to all these that peaceful soul of thine, 
Meek, modest, which all brawlings doth decline." 

Dr. Ward maintained much correspondence 
with learned men. His correspondence with 
Archbishop Ushur reveals traits of diversified 
learning, especially in biblical and oriental criti- 
cism. * In his letters to the elder Vossius he ani- 
madverts upon that distinguished author's Histo- 
ry of Pelagianism. His character cannot be bet- 
ter described than in the following beautiful pas- 
sage from Dr. Fuller's History of the University 
of Cambridge. " He was a Moses, not only for 
slowness of speech, but otherwise meekness of 
nature. Indeed, when, in my private thoughts, I 
have beheld him and Dr. Collins, t (disputable 
whether more different, or more eminent in their 
endowments,) I could not but remember the run- 
ning of Peter and John to the place where Christ 



* Dr. Usher, in one of these letters, corrects a misprint in the 
Translator's Preface, where the name Efnard should be Eynard, 
or Eginhardus. 

f Samuel Collins, Provost of King's College, and for forty years 
Regius Professor. " As Caligula, is said to have sent his soldiers 
vainly to fight against the tide, with the same success have any 
encountered the torrent of his Latin in disputation," 



193 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



was buried. In which race, John came first, as 
youngest and swiftest ; but Peter first entered 
the grave. Dr. Collins had much the speed of 
him in quickness of parts ; but let me say, (nor 
doth the relation of pupil misguide me,) the other 
pierced the deeper into underground and profound 
points in divinity. Now as high winds bring 
some men the sooner into sleep, so, I conceive, 
the storms and tempests of these distracted times 
invited this good old man the sooner to his long 
rest, where we leave him, and quietly draw the 
curtains about him." 



AXDRETV DOWXES. 

Dr. Downes was Fellow of St. John's College, 
Cambridge. For full forty years he was Regius 
Professor of Greek in that famous University. 
He is especially named by the renowned John 
Selden as eminently qualified to share in the 
translation of the Bible. Thus it is the happiness 
of Dr. Downes to be "praised by a praised man 
for no man was ever more exalted for learning 
and critical scholarship than Selden, who was 
stvled by Dr. Johnson, "monarch in letters:" 



ANDREW DOWNES. 199 

and by Milton, " chief of learned men in Eng- 
land ;" and by foreigners, " the great dictator of 
learning of the English nation." His decisive 
testimony to Downes's ability was given from 
persona] knowledge, Andrew Downes was one 
of the revising committee of twelve, composed 
of the principal members of each companv, 
who met at London to prepare the copy for the 
press. This venerable Professor is spoken of as 
" one composed of Greek and industry." He 
bestowed much labor on Sir Henry Savile's 
celebrated edition of the works of Chrysostom, 
and many of the learned notes were furnished by 
him. " His pains were so inlaid" with that 
monument of erudition, that " both will be pre- 
served together." He died, Febuary 2nd, 1625, 
at the great age of eighty-one years. 



JOHN BOIS. 

This devoted scholar was a native of Nettle- 
stead, in Suffolk, where he was born January 
3rd, 1560. His father William Bois, a convex 
from papistry, was a pious minister, and a very 
learned man ; and at the time of his death, was 



200 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

Rector of West Stowe. His mother, Mirable 
Poolye, was a pious woman, and a great reader 
of the Bible in the older translations. He was 
the only child that grew up. He was carefully 
taught by his father ; and at the age of five 
years, he had read the Bible in Hebrew. By the 
time he was six years old, he not only wrote 
Hebrew legibly, but in a fair and elegant char- 
acter. Some of these remarkable manuscripts 
are still carefully preserved. This precocious 
scholar, who yet lived to a ripe and hale old 
age, was sent to school at Hadley, where he 
was a fellow-student w T ith Bishop Overall. He 
was admitted to St. John's College, Cambridge, 
in 1575. He soon distinguished himself by his 
great skill in Greek, writing letters in that 
language to the Master and Senior Fellows, when 
he had been but half a year in College. Bois 
was a pupil to Dr. Downes, then chief lecturer on 
the Greek language, who took such delight in his 
promising disciple, that he treated him with great 
familiarity, even while he was a freshman. In 
addition to his lectures, which Dr. Downes read 
five times in the week, he took the youth to his 
chambers, where he plied him exceedingly. He 
there read with him twelve Greek authors, in 
verse and prose, the hardest that could be found. 



JOHN BOIS. 201 

both for dialect and phrase. It was a common 
practice with the young enthusiast to go to the 
University Library at four o'clock in the morning, 
and stay without intermission till eight in the 
evening. 

When John Bois was elected Fellow of his 
College in 1580, he was laboring under that 
formidable disease, the small pox. But, with his 
usual resolution, rather than lose his seniority, 
he had himself wrapped in blankets, and was 
carried to be admitted to his office by his tutors, 
Henry Coppinger and Andrew Downes. He com- 
menced the study of medicine ; but fancying 
himself affected with every disease he read of, he 
quitted the study in disgust, and turned his atten- 
tion to divinity. He was ordained a deacon, 
June 21st, 1583 ; and the next day, by a dispen- 
sation, he was ordained a priest of the Church of 
England. 

For ten years, he was Greek lecturer in his 
college ; and, during that time, he voluntarily 
lectured, in his own chamber, at four o'clock in 
the morning, most of the Fellows being in atten- 
dance ! It may be doubted, whether, at the pre- 
sent day, a teacher and class so zealous could be 
found at old Cambridge, new Cambridge, or any 
where else, — not excluding laborious Germany. 
9* 



202 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



At this time, Thomas Gataker, afterwards one of 
the most distinguished of the Westminster Divines, 
was a pupil to Bois. 

On the death of his father, Mr. Bois succeeded 
to the rectory of West Stowe, but soon resigned it, 
and went back to his beloved College. The 
Earl of Shrewsbury made him his chaplain ; but 
this too he soon resigned. When he was about 
thirty-six years old, Mr. Holt, Rector of Box- 
worth, died, leaving the advowson of that living 
in part of a portion to one of his daughters ; and 
requesting of some of his friends, that " if it 
might be procured, Mr. Bois, of St. John's Col- 
lege, might become his successor.'' The matter 
being intimated to that gentleman, he went over 
to take a view of the lady thus singularly por- 
tioned, and commended to his favorable regards. 
The parties soon took a sufficient liking to each 
other, and the somewhat mature lover was pre- 
sented to the parsonage by his future bride, and 
instituted by Archbishop Whitgift, October 13th, 
1596. He fulfilled the other part of the bargain, 
by marrying the lady, February ?th, 1598 ; and 
so resigned his beloved Fellowship at St. John's. 
He could not, however, wholly separate himself 
from old associates and pursuits. Every week 
he rode over from Boxworth to Cambridge to 



JOHN BOIS. 203 

hear some of the Greek lectures of Dowries, and 
the Hebrew exercises of Lively, and also the 
divinity-acts and lectures. Every Friday he 
met with neighboring ministers, to the number 
of twelve, to give an account of their studies, and 
to discuss difficult questions. 

W hile thus absorbed in studious pursuits, he 
left his domestic affairs to the management of his 
wife, whose want of skill in a few years reduced 
him to bankruptcy. He was forced to part with 
his chief treasure, and to sell his library, which 
contained one of the most complete and costly 
collections of Greek literature that had ever been 
made. This cruel loss so disheartened him, as 
almost to drive the poor man from his family and 
his native country. He was, however, sincerely 
attached to his wife, with whom he lived in great 
happiness and affection for five and forty years. 

In the translation of the Bible, he had a double 
share. After the completion of the Apocrypha, 
the portion assigned to his company, the other 
Cambridge company, to whom was assigned from 
the Chronicles to the Canticles inclusively, ear- 
nestly intreated his assistance, as he was equally 
distinguished for his skill in Greek and Hebrew. 
They were the more earnest for his aid, because 
of the death of their president, Professor Lively, 



204 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



which took place shortly after the work was un- 
dertaken. During the four years thus employed, 
Mr. Bois gave close attention to the duty, from 
Monday morning to Saturday evening, spending 
the Sabbaths only at his rectory with his family. 
For all this labor he received no worldly compen- 
sation, except the use of his chambers and his 
board in commons. When the work had been 
carried through the first stage, he was one of the 
twelve delegates sent, two from each of the com- 
panies, to make the final revision of the work at 
Stationers' Hall, in London. This occupied nine 
months, during which each member of the com- 
mittee received thirty shillings per week from 
John Barker, the King's printer, to whom the 
copy-right belonged. Mr. Bois took notes of all 
the proceedings of this committee. 

He rendered a vast amount of aid to his fellow- 
translator, Sir Henry Savile, in his great literary 
undertaking, the edition of Chrysostom. Sir 
Henry speaks of him, in the Preface, as the " most 
ingenious and most learned Mr. Bois ;" and it is 
said that the aged Professor Downes was so much 
hurt at the higher commendations bestowed on 
his quondam pupil's share in that labor than upon 
his own, that he never got entirely over it. Mr. 
Bois, however, did not cease to regard his veteran 



JOHN BOIS. 



205 



instructor with the utmost respect and esteem. 
For his many years of hard labor bestowed upon 
Chrysostom, he received no compensation, ex- 
cept a single copy of the work. This was prob- 
ably owing to the sudden demise of Sir Henry 
Savile, who was intending to make him one of 
the Fellows of Eton College 

Mr. Bois continued to be quite poor and neg- 
lected, till Dr. Lancelot Andrews, then Bishop of 
Ely, and who had also been employed in the Bi- 
ble-translation, of his own accord made him a 
Prebendary of the cathedral church of Ely, in 
1615. He there spent the last tw r enty-eight years 
of his life, in studious retirement, providing a 
curate for Boxworth. After his removal to Ely, 
he visited Boxworth twice a year, to administer 
the sacraments and preach, and to relieve the 
wants of the poor. He left, at his death, as 
many leaves of manuscript as he had lived days 
in his long life ; for even in his old age, he spent 
eight hours in daily study, mostly reading and 
correcting ancient authors. Among his w r ritings, 
was a voluminous commentary in Latin on the 
Gospels and Acts, which was published some 
twelve years after his decease. 

He was of a social and cheerful disposition, 
and had a great fund of anecdote 'at command. 



206 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



He kept up a strict family government. His 
charity to the necessitous poor was limited only by 
the bottom of his purse ; though he " chode the 
lazy," knowing that charity's eyes should be 
open, as well as her hands. He was 66 in fastings 
oft," sometimes twice in the week ; and punctual 
in all religious duties. His preaching was with- 
out notes, though not without much prayer and 
study. In performing this solemn duty, his main 
endeavor was to make himself easily understood 
by the humblest and most ignorant of his hearers. 
This is a wise and noble trait in one of such vast 
acquirements ; and one to whom Dalechamp, in 
dedicating to him a eulogy on Thomas Harrison, 
said with truth, that he was u in highest esteem 
with studious foreigners, and second to none in 
solid attainments in the Greek tongue." He was 
so familiar with the Greek Testament, that he 
could, at any time, turn to any word that it 
contained. 

His manner of living was quite peculiar. He 
was a great pedestrian all his days. He was 
also a great rider and swimmer ; and possessed 
a very strong constitution, which all his 
hard study could not impair. He took but two 
meals, dinner and supper, and never drank at 
any other time. He would not study between 



JOHN BOIS. 



207 



supper and bed-time ; but spent the interval in 
pleasant discourse with friends. He took special 
care of his teeth, and carried them nearly all to 
the grave. Up to his death, his brow was un- 
wrinkled, his sight clear, his hearing quick, his 
countenance fresh, and head not bald. He as- 
cribed his health and longevity to the observance 
of three rules, given him by one of his college 
tutors, Dr. Whitaker : — First, always to study 
standing ; secondly, never to study in a draft of 
air ; and thirdly, never to go to bed with his feet 
cold ! 

He had four sons and three daughters. The 
first-born son died an infant. The second son 
and eldest daughter he saw married. The third 
son died of consumption, at the age of thirty, at 
Ely, where he was a canon in the cathedral. The 
youngest son died of the small-pox, while a stu- 
dent of St. John's College. Thus the father was 
not without his sore afflictions. These seem to 
have been sanctified to his good. He said of 
himself, near the end of his life, — " There has not 
been a day for these many years, in which I have 
not meditated at least once upon my death." 
Thus he met death, at last, with great joy, as an 
old acquaintance, and long expected friend. Hav- 
ing survived his wife for two lonesome years, Mr. 



208 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

Bois had himself carried about five hours before 
his end, into the room where she died. He there 
expired, on the Lord's Day, January 14th, 1643, 
in the eighty-fourth year of his age. " He went 
unto his rest on the day of rest ; a man of peace, 
to the God of peace." 



JOHN "WARD. 



This name closes the original list of King 
James's translators. Dr. Ward was Fellow of 
King's College, Cambridge. Fuller gives him 
the strange title of " Regal," probably denoting 
some station in the University. All that w T e gather 
of this Dr. Ward is that he was Prebendary of 
Chichester, and Rector of Bishop's Waltham in 
Hampshire. 



It remains for us to add a brief account of 
some, who are known to have assisted in different 
stages of the work. It has been shewn that two 
or three of those who w x ere named in the King's 
commission, died soon after their appointment. 
At least two others appear to have taken their 
places, and therefore require our notice. 



JOHN AGLIOXBY. 

Dr. Aglionby was descended from a respectable 
family in Cumberland. In 1583, he became a 
student in Queen's College, Oxford, of which 
college he afterwards became a Fellow. After 
receiving ordination, he travelled in foreign coun- 
tries ; and, on his return, was made chaplain in 
ordinary to Queen Elizabeth, who endured no 
drone or dunce about her. In 1601, he was made 



210 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



Rector of Blechindon. In the same year, he was 
chosen Principal of St. Edmund's Hall, in the 
University of Oxford ; and about the same time, 
he became Rector of Islip. On the accession of 
James L, he was appointed chaplain in ordinary 
to the King. Dr. Aglionby was deeply read in 
the fathers and the schoolmen, " an excellent 
linguist," and an elegant and instructive preacher. 
It is said of him by Anthony Wood, in his 
Athanse, — " What he hath published I find not ; 
however, the reason w T hy I set him down here is, 
that he had a most considerable hand in the Trans- 
lation of the New Testament, appointed by King 
James I., in 1604." Dr. Aglionby died at his 
rectory, on the sixth day of February, 1609, aged 
forty-three. In the chancel of his church at 
Islip, is a tablet erected to his memory by his 
widow. Thus he lived just long enough to do 
the best work he could have done in this world. 



LEONARD HUTTEN. 

This divine was bred at Westminster School ; 
from whence he was elected, on the score of 
merit, to be a student of Christ's Church, one of 



LEONARD HUTTSN. 



211 



the Oxford colleges, in 1574. He there devoted 
himself, with unwearied zeal, to the pursuit of 
academical learning in all its branches. He took 
orders in due time, and became a frequent preach- 
er. In 1599, at which time he was a Bachelor in 
Divinity of some eight years' standing, and also 
Vicar of Flower in Northamptonshire, he was 
installed canon of Christ's Church. He was 
well known as an " excellent Grecian," and an 
elegant scholar. He was well versed in the 
fathers, the schoolmen, and the learned languages, 
which were the favorite studies of that day ; and 
he also investigated with care the history of his 
own nation. In his predilection for this last 
study he shewed good sense, a seeing," as an old 
writer has it, " history, like unto good men's 
charity, is, though not to end, yet to begin, at 
home, and thence to make its methodical pro- 
gress into foreign parts." Of Dr. Hutten it is 
expressly stated by Wood, that "he had a hand 
in the translation of the Bible." He died May 
17th, 1632, aged seventy-two. 

Thus we close the best record, which, with 
very great care and research, we have been able 
to make, of this roll of ancient scholars. Their 
united labors, bestowed upon the common Eng 



212 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



lish version of the Bible, have produced a volume 
which has exerted a greater and happier influence 
on the world, than any other which has appeared 
since the original Scriptures themselves were 
given to mankind. 

Several other persons w r ere employed in vari- 
ous stages of the work. In a letter from the 
King to the Bishop of London, dated July 22d, 
1604, the monarch says, — -"We have appointed 
certain learned men, to the number of four and 
fifty, for the translating of the Bible." As the 
authentic lists contain but forty-seven names, it 
is presumed the others were certain " divines " 
referred to in the fifteenth article of the royal 
instrcutions as to the mode of prosecuting the 
work. In this fifteenth article it is provided, 
that besides the several directors or presidents 
of the different companies, "three or four of the 
most ancient and grave divines in either of the 
Universities, not employed in translating, be as 
signed by the Vice-Chancellor, upon conference 
with the rest of the Heads, to be overseers of the 
Translation, as well Hebrew as Greek, for the 
better observance of the fourth rule." That rule 
required, that among the different meanings of 
any word, that one should be adopted which is 
most sanctioned by the Fathers, and is most 



LEONARD HUTTEN. 

" agreeable to the propriety of the place, and the 
analogy of the faith." It is not known who those 
supervisors were ; but if one of the Universities 
designated three of them, and the other desig- 
nated four, it would make out the requisite num- 
ber. 

When the six companies had gone through 
with their part of the undertaking, three copies 
w 7 ere sent to London ; one from the two com- 
panies at Cambridge, another from those at Ox- 
ford, and the third from those at Westminster. 
Each company also delegated two of its ablest 
members to go up to London, and prepare a 
single copy from these three. When the Synod 
of Dort was discussing the subject of preparing 
a version to be authorized for the use of the 
Dutch churches, Dr. Samuel Ward, one of the 
members, informed that celebrated body as to 
the manner in which that business had been con- 
ducted in England. He then stated, that this 
last single copy was arranged by twelve divines 
" of good distinction, and thoroughly conversant 
in the work from the beginning ;" and he, as one 
of the Translators, must have knowm the number. 

This oft revised and completed copy was then 
referred, for final revision in preparation for the 
press, to Dr. Smith, one of the most active of 



213 



214 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



the Translators, and soon after made Bishop of 
Gloucester, and to Dr. Bilson, then Bishop of 
Winchester. These two prepared the summary 
of contents placed at the head of the chapters, 
and carefully saw the work through the press in 
the year of grace, 1611. 



THOMAS BILSON. 

Dr. Thomas Bilson was of German parentage, 
and related to the Duke of Bavaria. He was 
born in Winchester, and educated in the school 
of William de Wykeham. He entered New Col- 
lege, at Oxford, and was made a Fellow of his 
College in 1565. He began to distinguish him- 
self as a poet ; but, on receiving ordination, gave 
himself wholly to theological studies. He was 
soon made Prebendary of Winchester, and War- 
den of the College there. In 1596, he was made 
Bishop of Worcester; and three years later, was 
translated to the see of Winchester, his native 
place. He engaged in most of the polemical 
contests of his day, as a stiff partizan of the 
Church of England. When the controversy 
arose as to the meaning of the so called Apos- 



THOMAS BILSON. 



215 



ties' Creed, in asserting the descent of Christ 
into hell. Bishop Bilson defended the literal sense, 
and maintained that Christ went there, not to suf- 
fer, but to wrest the keys of hell out of the 
Devil's hands. For this doctrine he was severely 
handled by Henry Jacob, who is often called the 
father of modern Congregationalism, and also by 
other Puritans. Much feeling was excited by the 
controversy, and Queen Elizabeth, in her ire, 
commanded her good bishop, " neither to desert 
the doctrine, nor let the calling which he bore in 
the Church of God, be trampled under foot, by 
such unquiet refusers of truth and authority." 
The despotic spinster ruled with such energy, 
both in Church and state, as to sanction the sav- 
ing, that " old maids' children are well governed !" 
Dr. Bilson's most famous work was entitled "The 
Perpetual Government of Christ's Church," and 
was published in 1593. It is still regarded as 
one of the ablest books ever written in behalf of 
Episcopacy. Dr. Bilson died in 1616, at a £-ood 
old age, and was buried in "Westminster Abbey. 
It was said of him, that he " carried prelature in 
his very aspect." Anthony Wood proclaims him 
so " complete in divinity, so well skilled in lan- 
guages, so read in the Fathers and Schoolmen, so 
judicious in making use of his readings, that at 



216 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



length he was found to be no longer a soldier, but 
a commander in chief in the spiritual warfare, 
especially when he became a bishop !" 



RICHARD BANCROFT. 

Tn the Translators' Preface, which used to be 
printed with all the earlier editions of the Bible, 
there is an allusion to one who was the " chief 
overseer and task-master under his Majesty, to 
whom were not only we, but also our whole 
Church, much bound/' This was Dr. Bancroft, 
then Bishop of London, on whom devolved the 
duty of seeing the King's intentions in regard to 
the new version carried into effect. Though he 
had but little to do in the studies by which it 
was prepared, yet his general oversight of all the 
business part of the arrangements makes it pro- 
per to notice him on these pages. 

He w^as born near Manchester, and educated at 
Jesus College, Cambridge. He was chaplain to 
Queen Elizabeth, under whom he became Bishop 
of London in 1597. On the death of Whitgift, 
in 1604, he succeeded to the archbishopric of 
Canterbury. Tn one year thereafter, such was 



RICHARD BANCROFT. 



his fury in pressing conformity, that not less tharl 
three hundred ministers were suspended, deprived, 
excommunicated, imprisoned, or forced to leave 
the country. He was indeed a terrible church- 
man, of a harsh and stern temper. Bishop Ken- 
nett, in his history of England, styles lum " a 
sturdy piece ;" and says " he proceeded with rigor, 
severity, and wrath, against the Puritans." He 
was the ruling spirit in that infamous tribunal, 
the High Commission Court, a sort of British 
Inquisition. Nicholas Fuller, an eminent and 
wealthy lawyer of Gray's Inn, ventured to sue 
out a writ of Habeas Corpus in behalf of two of 
Bancroft's victims in that Court, and argued so 
boldly for the liberation of his clients, that Ban- 
croft threw him also into prison, where he lin- 
gered till his death. Fuller gives the following 
picture of this prelate: — "A great statesman he 
was, and a grand champion of church-discipline, 
having well hardened the hands of his soul, which 
was no more than needed for him who was to 
meddle with nettles and briars, and met with 
much opposition. No wonder if those who were 
silenced by him in the church w T ere loud against 
him in other places. David speaketh of 6 poison 
under men's lips.' This bishop tasted plentifully 
thereof from the mouths of his enemies, till at 



218 THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 

last, (as Mithradates,) he was so habituated unto 
poisons, they became food unto him. Once a 
gentleman, coming to visit him, presented him a 
libel, which he found pasted on his door; who 
nothing moved thereat, ' Cast it,' said he, c to an 
hundred more which lie here on a heap in my 
chamber.' " Peremptory as his proceedings 
were with all sorts of Dissenters, whether popish 
or puritan, he seems sometimes to have had a 
relenting fit. It is but fair to relate the following 
incident. Fuller tells of an honest and able 
minister, from whom he derived the statement, 
who protested to the Primate, that it went against 
his conscience to conform to the Church in all 
particulars. Being about to be deprived of his 
living in consequence, the Archbishop asked him, 
— "Which way will you live, if put out of your 
benefice ?" The minister replied, that he had no 
way except to beg, and throw himself upon Di- 
vine Providence. "Not that," said the Arcbishop, 
"you shall not need to do ; bait come to me, and I 
will take order for your maintenance." Such 
instances of generosity, however, were "few and 
far between." 

Imperious as Bancroft was to his inferiors, he 
set them an example of servility to himself, by 
his own cringing to his master, the King. In a 



RICHARD BANCROFT. 



219 



despicably flattering oration, in the Conference at 
Hampton Court, he equals King James to Solo- 
mon for wisdom, to Hezekiah for piety, and to 
Paul for learning ! Scotland owes his memory a 
grudge for his unwearied endeavors to force Epis- 
copacy upon that people. He was equally strenu- 
ous for the divine rights of kings and of diocesan 
bishops. He vigorously prevented the alienation 
of church-property ; and succeeded in preventing 
that most greedy and villainous old courtier, Lord 
Lauderdale, from swallowing the whole bishop- 
ric of Durham ! 

Dr. Bancroft died in 1610, at the age of sixty- 
six years, and was buried at Lambeth Church. 
He cancelled his first will, in which he had made 
large bequests to the church, and so gave occa- 
sion to the following epigram : — 

" He who never repented of doing ill, 
Repented once that he had a good will." 

In his second testament, he left the large library 
at Lambeth to the University of Cambridge. Al- 
though in his time, the political sky was clear, he 
is said to have had the sagacity to foresee that 
coming tempest, which Lord Clarendon calls 
" the great rebellion/' and which burst upon Eng- 
land in the next generation. 



220 



THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED. 



In his general supervision of the translation- 
work, he does not appear to have tampered with 
the version, except in a very few passages where 
he insisted upon giving it a turn somewhat favor- 
able to his sectarian notions. But, considering the 
control exercised by this towering prelate, and 
the fact that the great majority of the Translators 
were of his way of thinking, it is quite surprising 
that the work is not deeply tinged with their 
sentiments. On the whole, it is certainly very 
far from being a sectarian version, like nearly all 
which have since been attempted in English. It 
is said that Bancroft altered fourteen places, so 
as to make them speak in phrase to suit him. 
Dr. Miles Smith, who had so much to do with 
the work in all its stages, is reported to have 
complained of the Archbishop's alterations. " But 
he is so potent," says the Doctor, " there is no 
contradicting him !" Two of those alleged alter- 
ations are quite preposterous. To have the glori- 
ous word " bishopric" occur at least once in the 
volume, the office is conferred, in the first chap- 
ter of Acts, on Judas Iscariot ! "His bishopric 
let another take." Many of the Puritans were 
stiffly opposed to bestowing the name " church," 
which they regarded as appropriate only to the 
company of spiritual worshippers, on any mass 



RICHARD BANCROFT. 



221 



of masonry and carpentry.* But Bancroft, that 
he might for once stick the name to a material 
building, would have it applied, in the nineteenth 
chapter of Acts, to the idols' temples ! " Robbers 
of churches " are strictly, according to the word 
in the original, temple-robbers; and particularly, 
in this case, such as might have plundered the 
great temple of Diana at Ephesus. Let us be 
thankful that the dictatorial prelate tried his hand 
no farther at emending the sacred text. 



* It is not till about A. D. 229, that we find any record of the 
assembling of Christians-in what would now be called a church, 
— Barton, Ecc. Hist., 496. 



CONCLUSION. 



Having now completed these biographical 
sketches, we may close with a few pages relat- 
ing to the literature of the subject. On this, in- 
deed, a larger volume might well be penned. 

The first edition of the authorized version was 
printed, as has been stated, in 1611, and in a 
black-letter folio. The first edition in quarto 
appeared the next year. The successive re- 
prints, in different styles and sizes, became very 
numerous. In 1638, an edition revised by the 
command of Charles I., for the purpose of typo- 
graphical correction, was prepared by a number 
of eminent scholars, among whom were Dr. 
Samuel Ward and Mr. Bois, two of the o iginal 
Translators. The edition in folio and quarto, re- 
vised and corrected with very great care by Ben- 
jamin Blaney, D. I)., under the direction of the 
Vice-Chancellor of Oxford, and the Delegates of 



CONCLUSION. 



the Clarendon Press, in 1769, has been the 
standard edition ever since; till one was pub- 
lished in 1806, by Eyre and Strahan, printers to 
his Majesty. This impression approaches as 
near as possible to what is called " an immacu- ^ 
late text," as only one erratum, and that very 
slight, has been detected in it. Among so many 
reprints of the Bible, and in so many different 
offices, it would have been a mass of miracles 
had not many inaccuracies crept in through error 
and oversight on the part of printers and correct- 
ors of the press. As this is a point on which 
every reader of the Bible must feel some anxiety, 
it may be well to make the following statement. 
A very able Committee of the American Bible 
Society, spent some three years in a diligent and 
laborious comparison of recent copies of the best 
edition of the American Bible Society, and of the 
four leading British editions, namely, those of 
London, Oxford, Cambridge, and Edinburgh, and 
also of the original edition of 1611. The num- 
ber of variations in the text and punctuation of 
these six copies was found to fall but little short 
of twenty-four thousand,. A vast amount ! Quite 
enough to frighten us, till we read the Commit- 
tee's assurance, that " of all this great number, 
there is not one which mars the integrity of the 



224 



CONCLUSION. 



text, or affects any doctrine or precept of the Bi- 
ble." As this, however, is a point in which the 
minutest accuracy is to be sought, that Commit- 
tee have prepared an edition wherein these varia- 
tions are set right, to serve as a standard copy 
for the Society to print by in 'future. 

Infinite is the debt of gratitude which the world 
owes to its Maker for the Bible. Scarcely less 
is its debt to his goodness, in raising up compe- 
tent instruments for its translation into different 
tongues, unlocking its treasures to enrich the na- 
tions. This matter is finely touched by Dr. 
Field, a divine of the seventeenth century, in 
whose writings that great critic, S, T, Coleridge, 
was wont to take a deep and admiring delight. 

That most excellent light of Christian wisdom, 
revealed in the sacred books of the Divine Ora- 
cles, is incomparable and peerless, and whereup- 
on all others do depend ; the bright beams of 
which heavenly light do show unto us the ready 
way to eternal happiness, amidst the sundry turn- 
ings and dangerous windings of this life. And 
lest either the strangeness of the languages 
wherein these Holy Books were written, or the 
deepness of the mysteries or the multiplicity of 
hidden senses contained in them, should any way 
hinder us from the clear view and perfect behold 



CONCLUSION. 



225 



ing of the heavenly brightness ; God hath called 
and assembled into his Church out of all the 
nations of the world, and out of all people that 
dwell under the arch of heaven, men abounding 
in all secular learning and knowledge, and filled 
with the understanding of holy things, which 
might turn these Scriptures and JBcoks of God 
into the tongues of every nation ; and might un- 
seal this Book so fast clasped and sealed, and 
manifest and open the mysteries therein con- 
tained, not only by lively voice, but by writ- 
ings to be carried down to all posterities. From 
hence, as from the pleasant and fruitful fields 
watered with the silver dew of Hermo, the 
people of God are nourished with all saving food. 
Hence the thirst of languishing souls is restin- 
guished, as from the most pure fountains of liv- 
ing water, and the everlasting waters of Para- 
dise." 

It is of the highest importance, that the Bible 
in English should be placed in the hands of all 
who may be able to read it. This is due to the 
excellence of the translation itself ; arid much 
more to the value of its contents. To the in- 
quirer after religious truth, the Scriptures stand 
in the same relation, as the works of nature stand 
in to the inquirer after scientific truth. The nat 



226 



CONCLUSION. 



ural philosopher who should shut his eyes upon 
all the facts and phenomena of the material uni- 
verse, could not fall into greater blunders and 
follies, than the theologian who closes the lids of 
his Bible. Without this blessed Book, Protest- 
antism is nothing. Says Luther, a most enthusi- 
astic student and translator of the Bible,— " This 
volume alone deserves to occupy the tongue, the 
heart, the eyes, the ears, the hearts of all."* And 
again, — "While the Word of God flourishes, all 
things flourish in the Church. f 

The refusal of Popery to allow the common 
people free access to the Scriptures in their ver- 
nacular tongues, condemns their divine Author 
for not having originally inspired his prophets 
and apostles to write them in dead languages, 
and unknown tongues. God was not afraid to 
give the Old Testament to the Hebrews in their 
mother tongue ; nor to publish the New Testa- 
ment in the Greek speech, which was then more 
widely spoken and understood than any other. 
Has it ever been supposed, that the Churches at 
Corinth and Colosse, for instance, suffered any 



* Solus hie liber omnium lingua, manu, oculis, auribus, cordi* 
bus. versaretur. 

+ Florente verbo, omnia norent in Ecclesia. 



CONCLUSION. 



227 



detriment in receiving those inspired Epistles 
from the Apostle Paul in a language familiar to 
all their members ? Why, then, may not the 
people of modern Italy safely read the same 
writings rendered into their own tongue wherein 
they were born? 

For many centuries, while the Greek was a 
living and widely diffused language, the New 
Testament in its original form was as freely cir- 
culated and read as it could be in manuscript. 
And the early Latin versions were also industri- 
ously diffused among old and young in the Roman 
empire. We have a letter full of godly counsels, 
written by a bishop Theonas to Lucian, chief 
chamberlain to the Emperor Dioclesian before 
the latter had become a bitter persecutor. The- 
onas says, — " Let not one day go by without 
reading at a set time some portion of Holy Writ, 
and meditating thereon. Neglect not the read- 
ing of the Bible. Nothing so nourishes the heart, 
and enriches the mind, as the reading of the 
Bible."* In a most beautiful sketch of the re- 
ligious life of any pious husband and wife, Ter- 
tullian says, — "They read the Scriptures together. 



* This admirable letter is to be found in D'Achery's Spicilegi- 
um, HI. 293. 



228 



CONCLUSION. 



they pray together, they fast together, they mu- 
tually instruct, exhort, and sustain each other.' 7 * 
The sermons and other treatises of Augustine 
abound in exhortations to his hearers of every 
degree, to make themselves familiar with the 
contents of the Sacred Writings. In one place, 
he urges them to this, that they may be able to 
give a reason of the hope that is in them to any 
of the inquiring or the sceptical from among the 
heathen who may apply to them for instruction, 
rather than to the ecclesiastics.! Like Chrysos- 
tom, Augustine often closed his sermon with some 
important question to be discussed in his next 
preaching, in order to excite his hearers to reflect 
upon the subject, to search the Scriptures in re- 
gard to it, and talk it over among themselves. 
As many were unable to read, the rulers of the 
church took care that there should be a daily 
reading of the Scriptures in course for their 
benefit. Alluding to this, Augustine says, — 
" Since many of you cannot read, either because 
you have no time, or know not how, such must 
not forget to gain the doctrine of salvation at 
least through diligent hearing. "J In another 



* In Psal. 90, Serm. II. 
f Ad Uxorem, Ep. II. 8. 
+ Serm. 105. § 2. 



CONCLUSION. 



229 



place he says, — "The weak and the strong both 
driijk of the same stream, and quench their thirst. 
The water saith not, 4 1 am proper for the weak !' 
■ — thus repulsing the strong. Neither saith it, — 
' Let the strong draw near ; but if the weak com- 
eth, he shall be swept away by the force of the 
stream.' It flows so sure and so gentle, as to 
quench the thirst of the strong, without frightening 
the w^eak away, — To whom speaks the resound- 
ing Psalm ? and who exclaims, — 6 It is too high 
for me!' What the Psalm resounds, be it even 
of the deepest mysteries, it so resounds, that the 
very children are delighted to hear, and the un- 
learned draw near, and pour out the full heart in 
the song.*" Ambrose, the famous pastor of Mi- 
lan, exhorted his congregation to the daily study 
of the Scriptures. " In such studies," he says, 
" the soul is quickened by the word of God. This 
is the principle of life in our souls whereby they 
are fed and ruled. The more the word of God 
abounds in our souls, and is there conceived and 
understood, the more their life abounds; and, on 
the other hand, as the word of God is wanting 
there, so their life decays."! Jerome also con- 



* In Psal. 103, Serin. III. § 4. 
f In Psal. US, Serm. VII. 7. 



230 



CONCLUSION. 



stantly stirs up his readers to diligent study of 
the Scriptures. Thus he commends Laeta, a 
Roman lady, for making her daughters early con- 
versant with them. " Instead of jewels and silks, 
let them the rather delight themselves in the 
Holy Scriptures, never- having the gospels out of 
their hands," and " absorbing the Acts and Epistles 
of the Apostles with all the eagerness of the 
soul."* But perhaps none of the Fathers has 
spoken on this point so often, so fully, so earn- 
estly, as the eloquent Chrysostom, who preached 
in the very language in which the New Testa- 
ment was originally w r ritten. Costly as manu- 
scripts then were, he insists that even the poorer 
class should possess copies of the Scriptures, as 
w r ell as of the tools used in their worldly call 
ings. He often, both in conversation and preach 
ing, exhorted his hearers not to be content with 
what they heard read from the Scriptures at 
church, but to read them with their families at 
home.f 

So long ago as the fourteenth century, when the 
* Epis. 107. 

f For references on this point, consult Chrysostom's Homilies 
JIT. and IV. de Statuis ; Horn. J. I. and XXIX. in Genes.; Ser. III. 
and IV. de Lazaro : Horn. I. and II. in Matt.; Horn. X. XL XXX. 
XXXI. XXXII. and LVIII. in Joan.; Horn. XIX. in Acta.; Horn. 
I. ad Rom.; and IX. ad Coloss. 



CONCLUSION. 



231 



popish bishops in the House of Lords brought in 
a motion to suppress the use of the Bible, as then 
translated into English by Wiclif, they were stiffly 
opposed by " old John of Gaunt, time-honored 
Lancaster." This noble duke argued earnestly 
for the free circulation of the Scriptures. He 
was seconded by others who said, that " if the 
gospel by its being translated into English, was 
the occasion of men's running into error, they 
might know that there were more heretics to be 
found among the Latins, than among the people 
of any other language. For that the decretals 
reckoned no fewer than sixty-six Latin heretics; 
and so the gospel must not be read in Latin, 
which yet the opposers of its English translation 
allowed." The debate was closed by throwing 
the bill out of the house. And well might it be 
discarded. How much less than blasphemy is it 
to hold that Jt is dangerous that a book should be 
generally circulated and read, which has God for 
its author, and his eternal truth as its subject- 
matter, and which he has commanded all men to 
obey as the condition of their everlasting sal- 
vation ? 

Robeit Boyle, that devout son of science, on 
whom first the mantle of Lord Bacon fell, has 
said, — "I can scarce think any pains misspent 



232 



CONCLUSION. 



that bring me in solid evidence of that great 
truth, that the Scripture is the word of God, 
which is indeed the Graxd Fundamental. — And 
I use the Scriptures, not as an arsenal to be re- 
sorted to only for arms and weapons to defend 
this or that party, or to defeat its enemies ; but 
as a matchless Temple, where I delight to be, to 
contemplate the beauty, the symmetry, and the 
magnificence of the structure, and to increase 
my awe, and to excite my devotion to the Deity 
there preached and adored." Another scholar 
of the highest genius, S. T. Coleridge, who went 
as far in metaphysical studies as did Boyle in 
the pursuit of natural philosophy, has spoken in 
the like experimental manner of the Bible, — " I 
can truly affirm of myself, that my studies have 
been profitable and availing to me, only so far as 
I have endeavored to use all my other knowledge 
as a glass, enabling me to receive more light in a 
wider field of vision from the Word of God."* 

As to the Bible in its English form, it is safe 
to assume the impossibility of gathering a more 
competent body of translators, than those who 
did the work so well under King James's com- 
mission. Since then, a great many revisions of 



* Literary Remains, III. 139. 
9 



CONCLUSION. 233 

particular books in the Bible have been published 
in English, and some of them embodying the best 
labors of the most distinguished scholars. But 
who has dreamed of substituting so much as one 
of them all, in the place of such books as they 
now stand in the common version? The late 
Professor Stuart was a man of learning and piety, 
whose candor ran almost to excess. He prepared 
elaborate translations of the Epistles to the Rom- 
ans and to the Hebrews ; but while we gladly 
use them as helps toward the better understand- 
ing of those portions of the Bible, who would 
think of using them for devotional purposes, 
either to settle his faith, or to stir up its activities ? 
An edition of the Bible, with those labors of that 
celebrated Professor substituted for those in the 
common editions, would be a strange affair indeed ! 
It is quite certain that no portion of the work has 
been done over again since 1611, by any divine 
of England or America, in a way which, by gen- 
eral consent of the Christian community, could 
supplant the corresponding portion as it stands in 
our family and pulpit Bibles. 

And what has not been done by the most able 
and best qualified divines, is not likely to be done 
by obscure pedagogues, broken-down parsons, 
and sectaries of a single idea, and that a wrong 



234 



CONCLUSION. 



one, — who, from different quarters, are talking 
big and loud of their " amended," " improved," 
and " only correct" and reliable re-translations, 
and getting up " American and Foreign Bible 
Unions" to print their sophomorical performances. 
How do such shallow adventurers appear along 
side of those venerable men whose lives have been 
briefly sketched in the foregoing pages ! The 
newly-risen versionists, with all their ambitious 
and pretentious vaunts are not worthy to " carry 
satchels" alter those masters of ancient learning. 
Imagine our greenish contemporaries shut up with 
an Andrews, a Reynolds, a Ward, and a Bois, com- 
paring notes on the meaning of the original Scrip- 
tures! It would soon be found, that all the aid our 
poor moderns could render would be in snuff- 
ing the candies, — and these, it is to be feared, 
would too often be snuffed out ! It were better for 
them to be framing a Hamlet that shall supersede 
the master-piece of the "bard of Avon;" or a 
" Paradise Lost " that shall throw the great epic ol 
the seventeenth century into the shades of obliv- 
ion. Let tinkers stick to the baser metals ; and 
heaven forefend that they should clout the golden 
vessels of the sanctuary with their clumsy patches. 
When one of these nibbling critics tries his puny 
teeth upon this glorious and indestructible version, 



CONCLUSION. 



235 



it seems as unnatural as that scaring portent 
mentioned in < £ Macbeth ;" 

»A falcon, towering in her pride of place, 
Was by a mousing owl hawked at, and pecked.' 1 

But it is not well to be too much vexed at these 
petty annoyances, which will speedily pass away 
and be forgotten, as has been the fate of all pre- 
vious pests of the kind. 

Not that the utmost verbal perfection is claimed 
for the English Bible as it now stands. Some of 
its words have, in the lapse of time, gone out of 
common use; some have suffered a gradual 
change of meaning ; and some which were in 
unexceptionable use two hundred years ago, are 
now considered as distasteful and indelicate. 
But the number of such words is very small, 
considering the great size and age of the volume ; 
and the retaining of them causes but little incon- 
venience, compared with the disadvantages of 
wholesale projectors of amendment volunteered 
by incompetent and irresponsible schemers. If 
ever the time shall come for a new revision of 
the Translation, let it be done with the care and 
solemnity which marked the labors of King 
James's commissioners; and above all, let it be 
done by men who shall know what they are about, 



236 



CONCLUSION. 



and how it ought to be done. It will be a vast un- 
dertaking, affecting the dearest interests of ages 
of time, and millions upon millions of immortals. 

Meanwhile, it may help our contentment with 
the Bible as we have it, to notice what opinions 
have been expressed as to its merits by the ablest 
judges of a performance of this nature. These 
testimonials might be swelled to the size of a 
volume, but a few will be sufficient for the pre- 
sent occasion. George Hakewills, D.D., Arch- 
deacon of Surrey, thus speaks to the point . — 
" Of all the auncient Fathers but only two, 
(among the Latines St. Hierome, and Origen 
among the Grecians,) are found to have excelled 
in the orientall languages ; this last centenary 
having afforded more skilfull men that way than 
the other fifteene since Christ.*" The famous 
John Selden, in his Table-talk, thus utters his 
opinion, — " The English translation of the Bible 
is the best translation in the world, and renders 
the sense of the original best." Dr. Brian Wal- 
ton, the learned editor of a Bible, in nine differ- 
ent languages, and six tall-folios, assigns the first 
rank among European translations to the com- 
mon English version. Dr. Edward Pococke, that 

* An Apologie or Declaration of the Power and Providence of 
God. 1627. 



CONCLUSION. 



237 



profound Orientalist, in the Preface to his Com- 
mentary on Micah, speaks of our translation as 
" being such, and so agreeable to the original, as 
that we might well choose among others to follow 
it, were it not our own, and established by autho- 
rity among us." Dr. Middleton, Bishop of Cal- 
cutta, and for ever famous for his work on the 
Greek Article, says, — " The style of our present 
version is incomparably superior to any thing 
which might be expected from the finical and per- 
verted taste of our own age. It is simple, it is 
harmonious, it is energetic ; and, which is of no 
small importance, use has made it familiar, and 
time has rendered it sacred."* 

One Bellamy having made a blind and rabid 
attack on our version, in crying up some oppo- 
sition-wares of his own, he was thus chastised in 
the London Quarterly; — "He has no relish or 
perception of the exquisite simplicity of the 
Original, no touch of that fine feeling, that pious 
awe, which led his venerable predecessors to in- 
fuse into their version as much of the Hebrew 
idiom as was consistent with the perfect purity 
of our own ; a taste and feeling which have given 
perennial beauty and majesty to the English 



* Doctrine of the Greek Article, page 328. 



233 



CONCLUSION. 



tongue/"* Dr. White, Professor of Arabic at Ox- 
ford, to other strong commendations adds ; — 
" Upon the whole, the national churches of Eu- 
rope will have abundant reason to be satisfied, 
when their versions of Scripture shall approach in 
point of accuracy, purity, and sublimity, to the 
acknowledged excellence of our English transla- 
tion." Dr. John Taylor, of Norwich, a very 
learned man, but unhappily an Arian, thus de- 
livers his testimony; — "You may rest fully satis- 
fied, that as our English translation is, in itself, 
by far the most excellent book in our language, 
so it is a pure and plentiful fountain of divine 
knowledge, giving a true, clear, and full account 
of the divine dispensations, and of the gospel of 
our salvation; insomuch that whoever studieth 
the Bible, the English Bible, is sure of gaining 
that knowledge and faith, which, if duly applied 
to the heart and conversation, will infallibly guide 
him to eternal life. v t To this testimony let there 
be added that of Dr. Alexander Geddes, a learned 
minister of the Church of Rome, who himself 
also attempted a re-translation of the Bible into 
English; — "The highest eulogiums have been 



* London Quarterly Review, No. XXXVIII. p. 455. 
t Scheme, &c, Chap. XI. In Watson's Collection of Theologi- 
cal Tracts. Vol. I. p. 188. 



CONCLUSION. 239 

made on the translation of James the First, both 
by our own writers and by foreigners. And, in- 
deed, if accuracy, fidelity, and the strictest atten- 
tion to the letter of the text, be supposed to con- 
stitute the qualities of an excellent version, this 
of all versions, must, in general, be accounted 
the most excellent. Every sentence, every word, 
every syllable, every letter and point, seem to 
have been weighed with the nicest exactitude; 
and expressed, either in the text, or margin, with 
the greatest precision. Pagninus himself is 
hardly more literal ; and it was well remarked 
by Robertson, above a hundred years ago, that it 
may serve as a Lexicon of the Hebrew lanffuagre, 
as w T ell as for a translation."! 

Dr. Adam Clarke, the Wesleyan, in the Gen- 
eral Preface to his Commentary on the Bible, 
having spoken of the common version as superior 
in accuracy and fidelity to the other European 
versions, adds the following declaration ; — " Nor 
is this its only praise; the translators have seized 
the very spirit and soul of the original, and ex- 
pressed this almost every where with pathos and 
energy. Bssides, our translators have not only 



t Prospectus of a New Translation, &c. Page 92. The hint of 
Robertson has since been realized byBagster's Englishman's He- 
brew and Greek Concordance to the Holy Bible. 



240 



CONCLUSION. 



made a standard translation, bat they have made 
their translation the standard of our language." 

The late Professor Stuart, whose mind was so 
constituted that he neither clung to antiquity, nor 
shrank from novelty, thus gives his opinion ; — 
"Ours is, on the whole, a most noble production 
for the time in which it was made. The divines 
of that day were very different Hebrew scholars 
from what most of their successors have been, in 
England or Scotland. With the exception of 
Bishop Lowth's classic work upon Isaiah, no 
other effort at translating, among the English di- 
vines, will compare, either with respect to taste, 
judgment, or sound understanding of the Hebrew, 
with the authorized version."* Not to crowd 
the court with witnesses in superfluous numbers, 
let us close the taking of testimony on this point 
with the words of the grave and judicious Tho- 
mas Hartwell Home, in his invaluable Introduc- 
tion to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the 
Holy Scriptures ; — "We cannot but call to mind 
with gratitude and admiration, the integrity 3 wis- 
dom, fidelity, and learning of the venerable trans- 
lators, of whose pious labors we are now reaping 



* Dissertation on Studying the Original Languages of the Bible. 
Page 61. 



CONCLUSION. 



241 



the benefit ; who, while their reverence for the 
Holy Scriptures induced them to be as literal as 
they could, to avoid obscurity have been ex- 
tremely happy in the simplicity and dignity of 
their expressions ; and who, by their adherence to 
the Hebrew idiom, have at once enriched and 
adorned our language." 

We may well be satisfied and devoutly thank- 
ful for an English Bible whose sufficiency and ex- 
cellence has such ample vouchers. And if we 
were not content, it is almost frightful to think 
of the immense multitude of printed copies which 
must be superseded, before any new version can 
be generally adopted. Since the present century 
began, the Bible Societies in Great Britain and 
America have published some thirty-seven millions 
of copies of the present version ; and according 
to the laborious computations of Anderson, a still 
greater number have been issued on private sale. 
This vast amount is increasing more rapidly than 
ever. No book is so abundantly sold, or so freely 
given away. Doubtless, allowing largely for 
wear and tear, there are at least twenty-five mil 
lions of these copies now in actual use and ser- 
vice. The notion of displacing all these by 
copies of another, and especially if it be a very 



242 



CONCLUSION. 



different translation, seems to be rather visionary, 
to say the least. 

It ought to be considered, too, that the lan- 
guage of the current version is thoroughly blended 
with the whole religious literature of the English 
tongue. It also pervades the religious experience, 
and expresses the devotional feelings, of all the 
Christians who speak that tongue. Truly, the 
introduction of a very different translation, — and 
if not very different, there could be no reason suffi- 
cient to justify such a sweeping change, — must 
have a very disconcerting effect upon the public 
mind, and give rise to an infinity of vexations. The 
present translation has been, and is, the text-book 
for millions of Sabbath-School pupils, and re- 
ligious inquirers ; and is hallowed by associations 
so tender and sacred, that the attempt to discard 
it will seem to multitudes of devout men and 
women but little better than sacrilege. It was 
sufficient, they will say, for the salvation of our 
godly parents and others of our sainted friends, — 
and, with the blessing of their God and our God, 
it shall suffice for ours. 

Especially objectionable must be the attempt 
to furnish translations for the use of the various 
Christian sects. Our common version, though 
prepared by members of the Church of England, 



CONCLUSION. 243 

was prepared before dissent from that Church 
had became so very extensive and earnest. Hence 
it was. on the whole, drawn up in a spirit remark- 
ably free from sectarianism ; and all Protestant 
denominations, ever since, have confidently •ap- 
pealed to it, as to an impartial arbiter. To these 
denominations, it has always been the common 
standard, around which they have rallied against 
the usurpations and impostures of Rome. Now, 
were each denomination to issue for itself a new 
translation, modified to suit the peculiar opinions 
of the sect, it would place them all in the same 
position toward each other, as that which they 
together occupy toward Rome. It would cut oft" 
all mutual sympathy, by leaving no common "rale 
of faith " which the mass of the people could 
consult or apply. Each class of believers having 
its own rule of faith, there would be as many dis- 
tinct Christian religions as professed versions of 
the Bible. This multiplication of strictly and 
irreconcilably sectarian Bibles, each acknowl- 
edged only by the party from which it emanated, 
would proclaim a triumphant jubilee to scepticism 
and infidelity. If only some sects were to pur 
sue such a course, it must prove a suicidal policy 
to them; for it would be a virtual and practical 
confession that our long received and thoroughly 



244 



CONCLUSION. 



impartial translation is not in their favor, and that 
they could not sustain themselves except by a 
new version so framed as specially to help their 
cause. The denominations retaining the author 
ized translation would secure the whole benefit 
of its celebrity, its authority, and its mighty hold 
upon the affection and reverence of the Anglo 
Saxon race. 

For nearly two hundred and fifty years this 
translation has been in common use. During that 
time, it has had free course and circulation among 
successive generations speaking the English 
tongue. It was made ready in good season to 
cross the Atlantic with the first English colonists 
of America. During that time the reigning dy- 
nasty of England has changed once and again, 
America has become the greatest of republics, 
science has been even more often and fully revo- 
lutionized than politics, the arts of life have 
almost created society anew by marvellous inven- 
tions and discoveries, popular intelligence has 
brightened from its dawnings into the broad light 
of day, philosophy has restlessly traversed a 
thousand circles of inquiry and speculation, and 
theology has been rushing backward and forward 
through successive alternations, like a ship beating 
into port against wind and tide, and losing on one 



CONCLUSION. 245 

tack, what may have been gained on the other. 
And yet this glorious version, alone unchanged, 
remains unrivalled. Though, here and there, 
some have murmured and threatened, and some 
have complained and reviled aloud, and some 
have put forth their skill in "improved" or " cor- 
rected" versions, they have been wholly unheeded 
by the great body of readers. The common ver- 
sion was never more popular than it is now. It 
is in greater demand, more abundantly supplied 
by the press, more elaborately adorned by Chris- 
tian art, and more widely spread abroad than ever 
before. This among a people so intelligent and 
cultivated, and so prone to progress, is an unex- 
ampled popularity. There must be inherent and 
pre-eminent excellence in a work which keeps 
such firm hold upon the esteem and veneration of 
a race of men, who show but little conservatism 
as to any other matter of general concernment. 
While all else has been falling away, the word 
of the Lord " liveth and abideth for ever." 

This enduring popularity may in part be ac 
counted for by the personal character, the vast 
scholarship, and exalted piety, of its authors. 
The way had been well prepared for them by 
a succession of older translations and revisions 
so excellent, that our Translators modestly say, in 



246 



CONCLUSION. 



their Preface, that they did not " need to make a 
new translation, nor yet to make of a bad one a 
good one ; but to make a good one better, or out 
of many good ones one principal good one." 
Still, their work, though much assisted by the 
labors of the devout men and martyrs who had 
wrought in the same line before them, is essen- 
tially original. It was done with such prudence, 
diligence, and scrupulous care, that even the men 
who w r ould fain have supplanted it with something 
of their own, have been forced to extol it, as Ba- 
laam did the tabernacles of Jacob. " Let us not 
too hastily conclude," says Mr. Whittaker, "that 
the Translators have fallen on evil days and evil 
tongues, because it occasionally happens an indi- 
vidual, as inferior to them in erudition as in tal- 
ents and integrity, is found questioning their 
motives, or denying their qualifications for the 
task which they so well performed. — It may be 
compared with any translation in the world, with- 
out fear of inferiority ; it has not shrunk under 
the most rigorous examination ; it challenges in- 
vestigation ; and, in spite of numerous attempts 
to supersede it, has hitherto remained unrivalled 
in the affections of the country."* Who would 



* Historical and Critical Enquiry. P. 92. 



CONCLUSION. 



247 



be so tasteless and senseless as to insist on infus- 
ing" new wine into the old bottle ? Let us rather, 
to use the strong language of its able vindicator, 
Mr. Todd, "take up the Book, which from our 
infancy we have known and loved, with increased 
delight ; and resolve not hastily to violate, in re- 
gard to itself, the rule of Ecclesiasticus, — 6 For- 
sake not an old friend, for the new is not com- 
parable to him. 5 " 

The work, though not absolutely perfect, nor 
incapable of amendment in detached places, is 
yet so well done, that the Christian public will 
not endure to have it tampered with. It would 
be impossible, as has been demonstrated in the 
foregoing biographical sketches, to collect at this 
day a body of professors and divines, from Eng- 
land and America together, which should be equal 
in numbers and in learning to those assembled by 
King James ; and in whom the churches would 
feel enough of confidence to entrust them with a 
repetition of the work. The common version has 
become a permanent necessity, through its im- 
mense influence on the language, literature, man- 
ners, opinions, character, institutions, history, re- 
ligion, and entire life and development of the 
Anglo-Saxon race in either hemisphere. 

Taking into account the many marked events 



248 



CONCLUSION. 



in divine Providence which led on to this version, 
and aided its accomplishment, and necessitated 
its diffusion, — and also that to uncounted millions, 
and to other millions yet to be born, it is the only 
safeguard from popery on the one side, and from 
infidelity on the other, we are constrained to 
claim for the good men who made it the highest 
measure of divine aid short of plenary inspiration 
itself. We make this claim regardless of the 
supercilious airs of flippant Sadducees, or the 
pitying smiles of literary pantheists. Not that the 
Translators were inspired in the same sense as 
were the prophets and apostles, and other "holy 
men of old," who "were moved by the Holy- 
Ghost " in drawing up the original documents of 
the Christian faith. Such inspiration is a thing 
by itself, like any other miracle ; and belongs ex- 
clusively to those to whom it was given for thai 
high and unequalled end. 

But we hold that the Translators enjoyed the 
highest degree of that special guidance which is 
ever granted to God's true servants in exigencies 
of deep concernment to his kingdom on earth. 
Such special succors and spiritual assistances are 
always vouchsafed, where there is a like union of 
piety, of prayers, and of pains, to effect an ob- 
ject of such incalculable importance to the Church 



CONCLUSION. 



249 



of the living God. The necessity of a supernat- 
ural revelation to man of the divine will, has 
often been argued in favor of the extreme proba- 
bility that such a revelation has been made. A 
like necessity, and one nearly as pressing, might 
be argued in favor of the belief, that this most 
important of all the versions of God's revealed 
will must have been made under his peculiar 
guidance, and his provident eye. And the man- 
ner in which that version has met the wants of 
the most free and intelligent nations in the old 
world and the new, may well confirm us in the 
persuasion, that the same illuminating Spirit which 
indited the original Scriptures, was imparted in 
rich grace to aid and guard the preparation of 
the English version. 

The readers of this admirable version shall do 
well, if they avail themselves of every help to- 
ward a right understanding of it according to the 
intent of its authors. But such as can obtain no 
other help than the Book itself affords, by prayer- 
ful study and comparison of scripture with scrip- 
ture, may rely on it as a safe interpreter of God's 
will, and will never incur his displeasure by obey- 
ing it too strictly. Whosoever attempts to shake 
the confidence of the common people in the com- 
mon version, puts their faith in imminent peril of 



250 CONCLUSION. 

shipwreck. He is slipping the chain-cable of the 
sheet-anchor, and casting their souls adrift among 
the breakers. Against all such attempts let them 
be fully warned, who can only hear the " lively 
oracles" of God address them " in their own 
tongue wherein they w r ere born." Let them 
never fear but that the All-merciful w r ho has 
spoken to the human race at large, to teach them 
his love, his will, and his salvation, has so cared 
for the souls of the fifty civilized millions who 
now r use the English speech, as to repeat to them 
his teachings in a form most sure and sufficient 
as to the whole round of saving faith and holy 
living. The best fruits of Christianity have 
sprung from the seeds our translation has scat- 
tered. 



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